


The End of the Dream

by Nicor_Fyrweorm



Series: Last of the Time Lords [14]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Canon Temporary Character Death, Canonical Character Death, Character Death Fix, Episode: s05e13 The Big Bang, Gen, Identity Issues, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Not A Fix-It, Not Really Character Death, Prophecy, Series Finale, Temporary Character Death, The Author Regrets Everything, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Characters Do What They Want, The Doctor (Doctor Who) Needs Help, The Doctor (Doctor Who) is an Idiot, The Master Has Issues, The Pandorica, Timey-Wimey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:06:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28648767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nicor_Fyrweorm/pseuds/Nicor_Fyrweorm
Summary: Amy wanted to bring her husband back to life. Rory wanted to keep the Doctor alive. River wanted to see the Doctor one more time.The Doctor wanted to fix the universe - and the Master wanted to warn the Doctor.Surprisingly enough, everyone got what they wanted for once.Or the one where nothing and everything changes, and it'sfinallythe 26 of June of 2010.
Relationships: Amy Pond & River Song & Rory Williams, Amy Pond/Rory Williams, Tenth Doctor & The Master (Simm), The Doctor & The Master (Doctor Who), The Master & Amy Pond (Doctor Who), The Master & River Song, The Master & Rory Williams, The Master & The Doctor's TARDIS, The Master & The Master (Doctor Who), The Master | Koschei & The Master (Simm)
Series: Last of the Time Lords [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1511825
Comments: 14
Kudos: 31





	The End of the Dream

War all around, two suns overhead, burning like the fire of the enemy's bombs, like the lasers making the Great Houses _scream._

Run – Hide – Run – Hide – Run – _Watch out!_

A chocked scream, panicked eyes, trembling feelers, _please help don't worry I'm here I'm scared—_

Hand wrapping around hand and _run._

A nook in a dry riverbed, the war muted as the stars whirl overhead, a story woven out of hopes and wishes and promises, hand wrapped around hand. 

_“Let's see them, just you and me. Every single star in the universe. All that ever was, is, and will be. Together.”_

Who asked? Who ran? Who was the first to smile? 

He can't remember. 

What he _does_ remember, is that from that moment on, they had never been too far apart, if not in body, then in mind. 

Until a new war. Forget death – the thing that split them, that separated them, it was always _war._

The Cloister War brought them together. The Last Great Time War brought them apart. 

Theta and Koschei. The Doctor and the Master. 

Now, there's only the Doctor left. 

… If being stuck in an indestructible and inescapable box can be called _that._

Theta is gone. He vanished from sight and mind the moment Koschei died and the Doctor was brought back. He'd hoped the ghost was actually a remnant of the original Doctor's mind, that he would overwrite the new Doctor's and Koschei would find himself the ghost. But it didn't happen. 

Theta wasn't a ghost. He was an echo… or an _imaginary friend._

He pushes the thought away as soon as it crosses his mind, but this time, it isn't because of Theta. 

It's Amelia. 

Amy Pond, his little helper, the Girl Who Waited. 

And what did that get her? A painful death in some abandoned catacombs in the past, being reborn as an auton duplicate that believed itself human, finding out her fiancé doesn't remember her, that she never existed— 

And, he can only hope, losing her mind again when the Pandorica released the signal that activated the autons, leaving her fiancé behind as she ambled mindlessly to the Pandorica… 

Though, he has to admit, he didn't see her amongst the other autons when he tried to escape. Was a small detail left outside to guard the Underhenge? That's the only thing that makes sense. 

Amy Pond was a little girl who grew up with a spatiotemporal crack in her wall and adventuring with a daft old alien with a magic blue box in her dreams. There was nothing she could've done. 

The Pandorica opens, doors sliding aside obediently, and as the Doctor blinks down at his screwdriver shining in his face, he corrects himself. 

Apparently, Amy Pond could go against her auton programming to release the Doctor from the perfect prison. Who'd have thought? 

“How did you do that?” he asks softly, holding still even as the restraints keeping him in the chair slip away. 

He's too shocked, confused and, yes, _pained,_ to try and move just now. 

Amy swallows and turns the screwdriver off before gesturing with it. She's holding a torch in her other hand, and her eyes are red-rimmed with tears that an auton shouldn't be able to produce. 

“You gave me this,” she answers almost expectantly, and just in case, the Doctor checks. 

Nope, his own screwdriver is still in his pocket. He takes it out, to make sure, but they are identical. So, he gets out of the chair and carefully steps out of the Pandorica— 

And trips when _reality_ crashes down on him. 12010 and no time at all, Earth and the only planet in existence. _The end of the universe._

 _“And talk about mixing apples and oranges! You idiots think you can feed out of_ this?” _he asks the Angels with a scoff, voice devoid of the nervousness and slight panic he's feeling inside, as he gestures at the crack and carefully jumps behind the crate. “That's pure time energy! The fires at the end of the universe! I would know, I've been there!_ Nothing _can sustain itself on that!”_

 _Yet, even as he says it, Koschei realizes he's wrong. The_ fires _at the end of the universe? He was there, there's no_ fire _at the end of the universe, all the stars have gone cold! The universe collapses, freezes, it burns_ cold. _And_ time energy? _What kind of time energy could there be at_ the end of everything? _There can't be any! All of it has been spent, and the universe doesn't rewind itself!_

… Well, he was right about _that._ Of course, back then, Koschei hadn't realized what the Doctor now knows – what if the universe came to its end before its time? What if it ended because, oh, a link to the Time Vortex, to _pure time energy,_ such as a TARDIS, _exploded?_

So, even though he'd known there was a dead universe outside the Pandorica, the Doctor hadn't been prepared to _face it,_ and between that and the battered state of his body at the moment, he takes a second to breath, holding onto the Pandorica's door just in case. 

Amy observes, worried, but she seems almost afraid to approach, clinging to the screwdriver and torch. 

“ _When_ did I give you that?” the Doctor asks her when he gets his voice back. “The universe just ended. How could I have a future to give you that?” he adds, because he didn't give it to her in the past, he's sure of _that._

“You just popped out of nowhere and did,” she answers as confused as he is, before gesturing around. “If the universe just ended, how come we're still here?” 

“Because we just haven't gone yet,” he whispers as he finally looks around and sees the extra mounds of dust in the chamber, alongside what remains of his 'captors'. “Look at them. They're the Footprints of the Neverwere.” 

“Neverwere?!” Amy squeaks, clearly remembering Cardiff and what happened then. 

“ _Footprints,”_ he hisses again, stressing the word out as he steps up to one such 'fossilized' auton, half-broken as it tried to shield itself from what was coming. “They came, took what had never existed, and left. All of them, Chelonian, Drahvin, Atraxi, and so many others, they don't exist anymore. Never did. That's why there's just dust left. Cybermen, Sontaran, Judoon, Nestene, Daleks… something of them must still remain, or they would've been erased like everything else,” he explains as he looks around, trying to find out _why_ these specific creatures are still here. 

“And us? You said we just haven't gone yet. What does that mean?” 

“It means we're at the center of everything, the eye of the storm. This was a total event collapse, the universe literally never happened. History has collapsed, whole races have been deleted from existence. We're just the last light to go out,” he adds as he looks at the ceiling, at the moonlight still somehow getting in. “Where's Rory?” 

He's outside, lying on the ground and covered by a legionnaire cape… and he's very cold, still, and slightly bloody on the abdomen. 

“I killed him,” Amy chokes out as the Doctor kneels next to Rory, running his screwdriver over his companion. “Doctor, what am I?” 

He takes in a breath when he sees the results of the scan, before looking up at Amy. She's teary-eyed once more, impossibly enough, and she's holding her hands close to her chest, the left cradling the right – and the engagement ring on her finger. 

“You're a Nestene duplicate. A lump of plastic with dreams of humanity,” he explains callously as he stands up, pocketing his screwdriver calmly despite the way his hearts beat painfully in his chest. 

There's a hint of life in Rory, the last traces of a mind clinging to a dead body, waiting for that breath, that shock, that would bring it back to life. But he can't deliver that, not even if he somehow had the time to heal the injury that led to this. And if there were still autons in the Pandorica's chamber, there may be some of the Nestene left in the universe. He can't trust Amy has broken through her programming, that there is no programming anymore for her to break through. 

And if something, _anything,_ of the real Amelia Pond is in there, _she_ wouldn't survive killing Rory _again._

“But I'm Amy now!” she exclaims, almost pleading, as she tightens her hold on the ring. “Whatever was happening, that noise in my head, it's stopped. I'm Amy.” 

Oh, he wants to believe her _so badly…_ But he knows better than anyone how such 'noise in one's head' works. The drums had quiet days too. 

“That's software talking,” he dismisses her, and Amy looks _hurt—_

Before she shakes her head and looks at Rory's body, completely _devastated._

“Whatever. I don't care. Just, _help him._ Please, there has to be something you can do.” 

… Is there? 

He ponders that thought, and this time, the Doctor doesn't commit Koschei's mistakes. 

This time, he doesn't _hope._

The TARDIS has exploded, is exploding in every moment of time, which results in a total event collapse that started on the 26th of June of 2010. _River_ was piloting the TARDIS, so he marks her off as dead – and if his hearts' next beat is more painful, he chalks it to the damage the Dalek shot did to him. 

Rory is as good as dead without the help he would need to be resuscitated and _kept alive_ anywhere at hand. And Amy is dead too, even if there's a plastic copy of her in front of him right now. She was extrapolated from Rory's memories when the Alliance went to his house, just another piece of the perfect trap to put the Doctor in the perfect prison. 

… But she's _crying._

Amy Pond was a little girl who grew up with a spatiotemporal crack in her wall and adventuring with a daft old alien with a magic blue box in her dreams – and with an alien telepath nurturing a psychic link in her mind. 

True, it isn't the same as the Nestene consciousness, but if anyone could turn a psychic link back on the one who established it… could it be Amy? Koschei has met psychically-sensitive humans, even though the species isn't naturally so, and Amelia Pond is _not_ one of them. 

Then again, none of those other humans, psychically-sensitive or not, had coexisted for twelve years or more with a spatiotemporal crack so close to their sleeping minds. 

Dreams have more power, more _potential,_ than anyone ever gives them. _Imagination_ is a terrifying tool. Without it, there's no advancing, no improvising, no _impossible victories._

Without _dreams,_ the Doctor would've never been trapped in the Pandorica, because there _wouldn't_ be a Pandorica in the first place. 

True, the Doctor runs and meddles, but that is not why he's so dangerous. The universe knows it. The universe decided he was too dangerous to let run around freely anymore, and, ironically enough, that is exactly why the universe is dead now. 

Koschei would snort and make a quip about how they _got what they deserved._ The Doctor looks at Amy, and Rory, and the starless sky overhead – and lets his imagination run rampart. 

_“Whatever. I don't care. Just,_ help him. _Please, there has to be something you can do.”_

“All of creation has just been wiped from the sky,” the Doctor tells Amy, who turns to him with confused and _tearful_ eyes – and the Doctor scowls. “We have more important things to worry about than your _manservant,_ Amelia. One life isn't worth more than the whole universe.” 

Amy's eyes are wide open, shocked and uncomprehending, staring at him as if this is the first time she sees him. 

“No… No, that's not – That's not what you said, back in Starship UK, you said—” 

The Doctor remembers a sky almost too full of stars, and a pained yet joyful song echoing all around. 

_“Ah, but that's the way of things. Always,_ always _the same. Save one person or a hundred. One life for a country, for a planet. One planet in exchange for the whole of creation. … I would destroy a thousand worlds to get one person back. But that's not how it works. It never does. It's always one who pays the price of the whole. One life in exchange for the planet, for the universe. It's wrong. It's_ wrong! _It's wrong but they still do it, they still choose to sacrifice one for the other, to_ torture _one for the benefit of the_ bastards _in power,_ to get what they want, _and_ it's not **fair!”**

He remembers. Oh, he _remembers._

But he remembers something _else_ even more strongly. 

_“Get out of the way.”_

“Yes, I said a lot of things, didn't I? But don't forget, Amelia – I still destroyed my own planet, my family and friends, to keep the universe safe,” he answers calmly, emotionlessly, never looking away from Amy's eyes. “Rory is nowhere as important as that.” 

The Doctor remembers the way Koschei stumbled with ringing ears and blotching sight after Rory punched him, down in the destroyed Silurian colony, when he'd told him they had to leave Amy's body behind. 

_Amy_ sends him straight to the ground, no stumbling included, with her punch, her voice so loud in her anger and distress that the words make it through the static squeezing his brains. 

“ _He is to me!”_

The Doctor is not sure if he has a Nestene duplicate's strength or the damage from the Dalek's shot to blame for the grass stuck to his teeth, but he spits it out and smiles widely nonetheless. Because the one thing he _can_ blame for sure is the _feeling_ in Amy's hand, both fueling her punch and echoing from her mind in a way that is too _human_ to deny. 

“Welcome back, Amy Pond!” he laughs as he gets to his feet, his grin faltering as his whole body _screams_ at him to just stay down, especially the new burn he now sports on his back. “Sorry, I had to make sure it was really you in there,” he tells her as explanation, though that doesn't make her look any less like she's about to punch him _again._ “No, seriously! I couldn't tell you I have a way to fix things before knowing the Nestene wouldn't be after mine or Rory's heads again!” 

“Rory?” she repeats, finally lowering her fist, and the Doctor relaxes and rolls his shoulders with a grimace, pushing down the painful stretching of his burn. 

“Of course! Who are you going to marry in the morning if he stays dead? None of that, Amy. I've put too much work into keeping your fiancé alive to let it all go to waste because a bunch of idiots thought they were being clever. We're going to save Rory, fix the universe, get you two married, and go laugh in everyone's faces afterwards. Deal?” 

Amy looks at him _again_ like this is their first meeting, but a moment later, she smiles brighter than any star – and more mischievous than many he knows. 

“About time, Doctor. So, where do we start?” 

They start, of course, with Rory, because they need to stop the degradation of his body before his brain is _truly_ dead. And for that, the Doctor has Amy bring him to the Pandorica. 

… He would do it himself, superior Time Lord strength and all, but he's too hurt for one – and Amy's face when she lifts her fiancé up without problem is too funny to resist. Plus, more blackmail material. One can never have too much blackmail material. 

“So, you've got a plan?” Amy asks as soon as she carefully deposits Rory in the Pandorica's seat. 

“Some of one, but yes. Memories are more powerful than you think, and neither of you are ordinary humans anymore. Beyond the plastic, I mean. Time travel changes you, even if you don't notice it. It helps you remember things that never happened, that got taken out of time, among other things. That's why, when the Alliance took a memory print from Rory, they got a bit more than they bargained for,” he explains simply as he makes sure Rory is positioned correctly, before turning to Amy. “They got you. Not just your face out of a forgotten photograph that was left over after you vanished. They also got your heart and self, your _soul,_ if you want, because Rory is too in love with you to ever forget you completely, even if his conscious can't access those memories.” 

“Like Lamia said,” Amy whispers, wide-eyed yet smiling with as much love as the Doctor knows Rory feels for her. 

“Not even death will take the love out of his heart,” the Doctor quotes obligingly, smiling at Amy. “That's right. She wasn't foreseeing his death, but _yours._ Or, well, maybe his too. _Or_ no death at all. I mean, it was plain to see,” he adds with a dismissive shrug, grimacing immediately after. “Ugh, that sounded a lot like the previous Doctor. Remind me to never do that again.” 

“Sure thing. So, Rory loves me. That's kind of obvious, I mean, not to brag, but I didn't get this thing for nothing,” she lets out with a proud half-smirk, wiggling the fingers of the hand that holds her ring. “And that's why I'm back. As plastic. And a centurion. In the future. I still can't believe that.” 

“And if we manage to fix all this, you won't have to. Hopefully. Probably. _Maybe._ Ugh, I said _stop me!”_ he exclaims, but Amy just snorts again, uncaring about his plight. “Whatever, focus.” 

“Who, _me?”_

“ _Focus,”_ he hisses, barely holding back a smirk and the flare of joy at finally having this back, having _Amelia_ back. “Rory has time travel on his side, but you've got something even _better,_ Amy. You've got a crack in your wall,” he tells her, and her face at that is so confused and _indignant_ that, this time, the Doctor can't suppress his grin. “Take that look off your plastic face or it'll stick that way. No, listen, what I meant is that you grew up with a spatiotemporal crack in your wall, the whole of the universe pouring through your dreams every night. And _that,_ Amelia, gives us an edge they won't expect,” he explains, before finally stepping away from the Pandorica and activating its locking mechanism again. 

“What are you _doing?!”_ Amy shrieks, rushing to the box, but the Doctor manages to stop her before she can try something stupid like _get locked in there._

“I'm saving his life! Easy, take a breath. The Pandorica is the ultimate prison. You can't even escape by dying, it _forces_ you to stay alive.” 

“But he's…” 

“Not fully,” he answers when Amy's question catches in her throat, meeting her eyes and finally letting her go with a smile. “His body is mostly dead, but his mind still clings to it. The Pandorica will keep him like that, but it won't fix him. Not without a scan of his _active_ DNA to tell it how Rory should be.” 

“And how is it going to get that?” she asks in confusion, and the Doctor grins, pockets his screwdriver, and pushes back his left sleeve to show off the Vortex manipulator strapped to his wrist. 

“ _It_ won't. _We_ will.” 

“That's the wrist computer Captain Jack had in Cardiff, isn't it?” she asks, blinking in realization, and the Doctor rolls his eyes. 

“Vortex manipulator, Amy, pay attention. It's a cheap and nasty way to time travel, but the universe is tiny now, so we'll be fine. We'll pop back to the past, pick Rory up, get him here to give the Pandorica the sample it needs to fix our Rory, and pop him back in place. You'll get your fiancé back in 10 seconds, Amy, just put your hand here,” he explains with a huge grin, programming the Vortex manipulator and gesturing to it. 

Amy smiles. 

“No.” 

The Doctor blinks, his grin slipping a bit as he processes that single word, and Amy's smile softens into something he doesn't want to look at too closely. 

He opens his mouth to ask what she means, but for some reason, the words don't come out. 

Amy takes a step closer and lifts her hand to his cheek. Her fingers are a bit cold, probably owing to the temperature outside, but the ring feels warm against his skin. 

_“Show it to me. Show me the ring,” Rory asks,_ pleads, _and miraculously enough, Amy manages to do as told and takes out the velvet box, opening it to show Rory the ring. “There it is. You remember. This is you, and you are staying,” he adds as he takes the ring while grabbing Amy's shaking hand with his free one._

 _Amy Pond, the girl of his dreams, the_ only _person he will ever love like this, so strong and_ real _that he won't_ ever _forget again._

_Rory smiles, none of the nervousness he'd felt the first time he'd done this, and slips the ring on Amy's finger._

_“Amelia Pond. Will you marry me?”_

_As soon as he feels the gut-wrenching pain in his, well, his_ gut, _Rory grabs tightly onto Amy and engulfs her into the tightest hug he can give her._

_He won't leave her again, never again, this isn't her fault, Rory will protect her from the monsters, even those in her head, this isn't Amy's fault, it's not, Rory won't… ever again… he's not… leaving… no matter how… dark… it…_

The Doctor takes in a shaky breath and rests his hand on Amy's, making sure to press the ring tighter to her plastic skin, almost as if she could feel all the love Rory _poured_ into this tiny golden band and carbon-pressed rock with the gesture. 

“Nothing can get in the Pandorica,” he whispers, trying to convince her despite what he's just seen, and Amy's smile turns into a mischievous grin. 

“You did,” she points out, and before he can protest, she takes her hand back and turns to the Pandorica once more. “I'll stay here, keep Rory company. Who knows what kind of trouble he'll get into if I leave him alone.” 

“It'll only be a couple seconds, Amy. There and back again, just a blink.” 

“When have you ever been on time _anywhere,_ Doctor?” 

She's smiling as she says it, soft and caring, but the Doctor still feels the words stab him straight through the hearts. 

So, he takes another breath, pushing away the feeling, and looks at Amy once more. 

She's no longer the small seven-and-a-half-year-old who asked a stranger who crash-landed on her shed to help with a crack on her wall. This is a fully grown woman who has faced aliens and death and one unstable Time Lord with an identity crisis and come out all the better for it. This is no longer a princess battling dragons – she's the centurion walking out of the slain beast's lair. 

She's Amy Pond. And while little Amelia is still in there, the Doctor finally sees beyond the frail human and right to the strong woman that little girl has grown up into. 

“Good point. Alright, keep an eye on Rory, and watch out for fire and radio waves. I'll be back before you know it, but if these are still here, I'd rather not take any risks,” he answers, sobering and pushing away any doubts he might have still held, as he points at the fossilized Daleks. 

“Understood,” Amy answers with a nod, before smiling at the Doctor once more. “I'll see you in five minutes?” 

_“See you in five minutes, Amelia!”_

The Doctor grins. 

“Way before that,” he promises, reaching for the Vortex manipulator— 

And vanishes into thin air. 

* * *

Tonight is not the darkest night Rory has seen, but it feels somehow darker. There are no clouds, but the moon is c-shaped and thus not casting that much light. 

It's on nights like this, when there's still a moon up in the sky, that Rory thinks the darkness of the sky is somehow _blacker,_ even more than when there is no moon at all. 

It's on nights like this, and places like this one, when Rory has the strangest feeling of all… The feeling that there's something _missing._

He looks up at the big and empty house standing in front of him and gulps, clutching his torch tighter in his hand. 

_It's just an empty house, it's just an empty house, it's just an empty house—_

“Well? You're not scared, are you?” Arnold mocks, pushing his shoulder into Rory's much scrawnier one hard enough to force him to take a couple steps to keep his balance. 

“Of course not!” he answers immediately, looking up at his two friends with a scowl before allowing himself to hesitate. “It's just… Is it really safe? It looks alright, but who knows how long it's been empty…” 

Claude scoffs. 

“What kind of doctor are you going to be if you're scared of splinters?” he mocks, and Arnold laughs alongside him as Rory pouts. 

“I'm not scared of splinters!” 

“Yeah, right. Come on, chicken, let's get the treasure,” Arnold snickers, pushing the old wooden garden door open as much as the chain on the lock will allow for them to squeeze through. 

Rory hesitates again – but as soon as Claude is inside and Arnold turns to him, he steels himself and follows. 

The garden is overgrown, with a rusted swing that whines eerily with the breeze, and a moldy shed a bit further away. There's a vine-covered arch leading to the house, but the path looks clear enough when they turn their torches to it. 

The house is old and has been empty since forever, though they say a Scottish lady bought it not that long ago. But she left after spending a day in it, without any kind of explanation. 

_Some people,_ however, say that she left because there are ghosts in the house, those of its previous owners, and that they haunt its rooms and corridors. A lot of people say that they've seen lights turn on at night, and some other kids in Rory's school heard whispers when they broke into it one night on a dare. 

Which is why Arnold, Claude and Rory are here tonight. Claude got it into his head that there must be something important in this house for the ghosts to hang around, and Arnold immediately decided they would come here to check the place out and get the treasure. 

Rory isn't exactly close to either of them, but he's just as curious as the rest of his class, and so he accepted when, after overhearing their plans by accident, they asked him if he wanted to join too. 

“What if we get hurt?” Arnold had asked, starry-eyed at the chance of some kind of adventure in good old _boring_ Leadworth. “We might need a doctor.” 

Rory has made no secret of his dream to become a doctor, and _that_ was all Arnold had to say to convince him. 

Of course, now he finds himself a bit more hesitant. The door looks strong enough, not at all rusted or decrepit, but still… 

Claude tries the knob, as if such a place would be unlocked – and yet, the door opens with just a muted creak. 

The three boys exchange a look, and Arnold steps inside with a huge grin, torch up. 

Oh, why couldn't they have just had that sleepover Rory told his parents he was going to have? They could’ve stayed in the tents they put up in Claude’s garden and told spooky stories all night long instead, and it would have been just as scary but far safer than _this._

But if they did do that… Well, there's a reason Rory did agree to it all despite it being a bad idea, and that because part of him longs for something different, for mischievous grins and impossible stories and _adventure._

Which is probably why he's here now, with only two other eight-year-olds, entering a 'haunted house'. 

They step inside carefully, shining their torches on the dusty floor and the walls, and Rory gulps again. 

“Have you seen that?” 

“Seen what?” Claude asks while Arnold peeks into the kitchen, and Rory tries to keep his torch from shaking as he points its light to the frames on the walls. 

“There are no people in the pictures. They're all… empty,” he whispers, and Claude looks at them with a frown even as Arnold peeks back into the corridor with a snort. 

“So they liked landscapes. _Boring,”_ he huffs, turning to the living room. “Hey, there's a TV here! Do you think it works?” 

Claude grins excitedly and follows, but Rory turns to the kitchen instead. 

It's clean under the dust, well organized, and it looks as modern as his own. If this house has been empty for so long, shouldn't it look, like, old, and stuff? Why does it have the same fridge that Arnold's parents have? How come they don't have fancy and flowery napkins everywhere, or those glasses with squiggly patterns? 

And, if there really hasn't been anyone here in ages, how come there's food in the shelves? Food that _is still good?_

Gulping, Rory puts down the can of beans after checking the due date, and goes to the bathroom, where he can hear the others' voices. 

“Aw, I thought a message would write itself,” Arnold bemoans as he hops off the stool someone put in front of the sink, and Rory frowns before he notices the foggy stain on the badly cleaned mirror. 

“I told you, you have to call the ghost's name for that to work,” Claude snickers, but Rory is more focused on the tube of toothpaste in the glass on the sink. 

There are no toothbrushes. 

“Guys, I don't like this place. There's no treasure, can we go now?” he asks them, but all he earns himself are mocking looks. 

“Aw, are you scared? You're such a crybaby!” 

“Come on, let's check upstairs! There must be some pearl necklaces or gold earrings or stuff in the bedrooms!” Arnold suggests, and Claude immediately turns to guide them. 

“Yeah, let's!” 

“Guys, I'm _serious._ There's a ton of stuff in the kitchen that's still _good,”_ Rory insists, following up the stairs and making a note about how they _don't_ creak. “I think there's someone living here.” 

“Don't be stupid, there's no one living here!” Claude mocks, pushing open a door into a study with lots of books on the shelves and a desk covered in papers and pens. 

“Oh, guys, check this out!” Arnold calls from the next room, and Claude and Rory hurry to him only to see— 

“It's empty?” Rory points out, his words sounding more like a question due to his confusion. 

Because, unlike the kitchen and living room and study, this room _is_ empty. An empty room with just a table in the middle of it, and nothing else. 

_This_ looks more like what Rory expected, but that doesn't mean he can hold back a shiver as he looks around. 

“Can we go now?” he asks once more, but Claude rolls his eyes as he pushes past him and back into the corridor. 

“Shut up, chicken. We haven't found the treasure yet!” 

“What do you want this treasure for?” Rory asks, following alongside Arnold, and Claude stops in the middle of the corridor, illuminated by the moonlight coming through the window at the end of the corridor, before turning to them. 

“Well, I just want it! It must be important and expensive, right? Maybe it can even control the ghosts!” 

And just like that, Claude and Arnold are off again. 

“You can't go in there, it's not your room!” Rory protests as they peek into the room on the left, but they ignore him once again, excited when they see it's a woman's room. 

“Come on, look for earrings and stuff!” 

Rory sighs and can't help but roll his eyes. But he doesn't follow. 

Instead, he turns to the door on the right, feeling better going into this one than the other, and looks around. 

It's a bit empty too, with an open wardrobe with nothing inside, and a bed without sheets, and a desk with some colored pencils in a pot and some books, and – dolls? 

… Is this a girl's room? The bed looks small, like Rory's, and the table and chair aren't as big as Rory expected. Did a girl his age live here? 

Carefully, he approaches the desk, shining his torch slowly around the room, seeing the dust on the otherwise white mattress, and the empty shelves, and the crack on the wall just over the desk. 

And then, he looks down at the desk and carefully picks up a thin book. 

_Pandora's Box_

“I have this book,” Rory whispers in surprise, seeing the same box with the circular designs on its sides that is stamped on his own copy, back home. 

There are a couple more books about Romans on Britain and fairies, so Rory nods to himself. It _is_ a girl's room. Though the Roman thing is weird, he doesn't know any girl who likes Romans as much as this one seemed to do. Also, that book looks _really_ new under all the dust. 

So, he pushes the thought back and turns to the dolls instead, expecting princesses and maybe Romans – and finds a box. 

A blue telephone box with the words _Police Box_ on it. 

Rory frowns, blowing the dust off the box to make sure he saw that right, before turning to the dolls themselves. One is of a red-haired girl in a red-spotted white dress, with a blue coat and red boots, and it looks like those Rory's class made in art class last year. So, the girl who lived here made this doll… Did she make it look like herself? Does that mean the other dolls are the rest of her family? 

Rory turns to the only other doll he can see, more curious than scared now, and picks it up to carefully blow the dust off of it. 

This one is a man, taller than the girl, dressed in what look like ragged black clothes, and with shockingly blond hair. There's stubble on his round face, and a grin that looks almost too big for the doll's face. The eyes are green, but whoever painted them put a spot of yellow in the middle and a ring of brown around the green. In his hand is a silver stick with a blue tip. 

Is it supposed to be a… wizard? Is that a wand? 

Well, one way or another, Rory puts the wizard's doll next to the girl's, both of them smiling up at him, one big and sharp and the other bright and excited, as they hold hands next to the blue box. 

_They look ready for an adventure,_ Rory thinks, and feels _jealous._

There's a flash of light and a crackle of electricity at his back, and Rory turns around with a gasp— 

There's someone in the room, in front of the window, darkened as the moon shines down on him from behind – but Rory sees the dark coat and the short blond hair and the green eyes _glowing_ in his shadowed face. 

He turns to the desk, to the wizard's doll on the table, grinning up at him almost _knowingly,_ and he picks it up in one hand, looking up once more to see if he hasn't imagined it all— 

But the stranger is still standing there, letting his hands drop at his sides as he looks carefully around the dusty and empty room – and as the moonlight lands on his face, Rory sees that he _is_ the wizard whose doll he holds in his hand, with the stubble on his face and his eyes going pale like the yellow spot painted in the doll's green eyes. 

He turns to Rory at last, and the boy can't help but press against the desk at his back, clutching the doll tightly as if it could protect him from the man it is based on. 

“Hey, what was that noise?” 

“Did you find something, chicken?” 

Arnold and Claude rush into the room with wide grins – and crash into each other as they stop in shock, staring at the wizard standing in the middle of the bedroom. 

The wizard looks at them over his shoulder, his eyes glowing in the dark – and his head flashes white and blue, showing the skull under it and the _huge_ eyes— 

Arnold and Claude run away screaming as Rory pushes himself further back, hiding under the desk and clutching the doll tightly to his chest, turning off the torch in hopes of the _ghost_ not seeing him and leaving again, _please please please—_

The ghost makes some kind of chocked noise, bony hands clutching at its skull as it curls into itself – and as the flesh returns to its bones, it drops to its knees with a gasp. 

Rory stays _very_ still and holds his breath. 

The ghost is gasping, he can hear it even if he can't see more than its arced back with the bed in the way, but the sound quickly turns to moans that become growls. 

“Not yet, not _yet!”_ a voice that can only be the ghost's hisses, and a moment later, the ghost stretches to sit on its heels. 

With the moon illuminating its face, Rory can see the pained grimace as it gasps with the movement, a hand shooting to its shoulder as if it was trying to grab something on its back. 

It looks terrifyingly like Dad that time he fell off a staircase when it broke. He kept telling Mom and Rory that he was fine even as he was lying on the couch with a heat pack on his back, but he flinched like the ghost every time he tried to move. 

… Can ghosts feel _pain?_

“Skaro ablaze…” the ghost whispers as it relaxes some, taking in a deep breath – and grimacing when its skin does the same flickering as before, showing skull and eyeball, before it turns solid once more. “Please, not _yet._ I have to fix this; I have to _save them…_ I can't fail them again,” he growls, bowing his head and glaring at his hands. 

“Are you alright?” Rory whispers, part of him hoping the ghost doesn't hear, but he still finds himself slowly crawling out from under the desk. 

The ghost's head lolls towards Rory and his glowing yellow-green eyes land on the boy's without hesitation. 

“… Just enough,” the ghost answers after a moment, breathing slowly, but doesn't flicker again. “Did I scare you?” 

“You appeared out of nowhere and turned into a skeleton,” Rory points out before he can stop himself, but rather than be angry, the ghost grins. 

“Good point. Sorry about that. I really thought I was done with that, that I was fixed but… Too much,” the ghost whispers, turning away from Rory to stare at his hands on his lap, his fingers flexing carefully before he straightens. “Alright, better now. Not fixed, but I don't really need these bits to operate right now. Well, nice to meet you, kid, but I've got to go. People to save, universes to fix, all that stuff,” he answers as he sends Rory a grin, standing up and stretching with a grimace, almost as if he'd grown stiff for the short time he'd been kneeling down. 

“You're not a ghost?” Rory asks as he stands up himself, still clutching his torch and the doll to his chest. 

“A ghost? Hah! Yes, I am, actually. But that has never stopped me before,” he answers with a new grin, looking down at Rory – and blinking in surprise. “Where did you get that?” he asks curiously, pointing at Rory's hands, and he immediately hands him the doll, though he doesn't really want to let it go. 

“Here. It was over there with the other doll. Did you know the girl? What about the family that used to live here? What happened to them?” Rory asks rapidly as he follows the wizard back to the table, where he picks up the girl's doll with a small smile on his face. 

“Yes, I know her. She came with me on an adventure, to save the universe, with the best man she could find. They helped me out over and over again, taught me so much… They saved my life, and now I'm going to save theirs,” he explains, and Rory looks at him in awe as his eyes turn gold and glow without glowing. “I'm going to fix the universe and bring everyone back. I'm the Doctor, kid. And I'll make everything better once again.” 

Rory lets out a soft _whoa,_ and when the Doctor grins at him again, Rory finally understands why the doll's grin was so big. There is _no other way_ such a _sure_ grin could ever be painted in any other way. 

“Can I help too?” Rory asks, and the Doctor's grin turns into a smile before he nods. “Great! What do you need? I know about medicine, maybe I can help you!” 

“My own nurse, huh?” 

“No way! I'm going to be a doctor and cure _everything!”_ Rory exclaims, shaking his head quickly because nurses are _lame,_ they don't fix _anything!_

“Oh, is that so?” the Doctor asks with his eyebrows lifted, before looking very far away and smiling softly. “That's a shame. I'm actually looking for a nurse. The best nurse I could ever ask for. Better, even.” 

“Really? What makes her so special?” Rory asks with a frown, because nurses just tell people where to go and bring the doctors stuff, right? 

“He, actually. Pay attention, kid. Nurses don't have to be all females.” 

“But why would a man be a nurse? Didn't he want to be a doctor?” Rory asks, confused, because _why_ would anyone want to be a nurse? 

The Doctor goes serious and kneels down so he can stare into Rory's eyes, and Rory gulps. 

“No, he didn't. He wanted to be a nurse. Doctors like me, we look into problems, find out what causes them, and fix them. The way I help people is by getting rid of whatever is putting them in danger, but I _can't_ take care of the people themselves. There are too many people, and the problems are so big sometimes that I can't be with them and fix everything at the same time. Like now. I am here to find out how to fix the universe, but I had to leave my friends behind, alone, to do it. But nurses… nurses are always there, with the people. They can't fix things the way I do, but they can take care of people in a way _I_ can't. I have to look at the numbers, at _how many_ people are in trouble, but they see _who_ is in trouble and help _them._ Nurses are there to smile and be by their patient's side, to make sure they are alright in a situation when there's no 'alright'. They hold people together while the doctors fix the problem,” the Doctor explains, serious but in a way that makes Rory believe he's telling the _truth,_ and Rory gulps again, his cheeks red in embarrassment. 

“That sounds really awesome,” he whispers, and the Doctor finally smiles again. 

“He is. I can do a lot of things that people like you or them never could, but the things _he_ does? I could never do that. And I could never do what _I_ do without my Ponds making sure I'm taking care of myself and not missing something _stupid,”_ he explains, his grin turning to a scoff before he shakes his head. “Alright, let's focus. You want to help? Because I'm looking for someone who can help my friend, and if you live in Leadworth, you might be able to tell me where he is,” he asks, and Rory grins widely and nods, excited once more to meet these friends of the Doctor that sound so _awesome._

Rory never knew nurses did so much stuff… and if doctors don't really take care of people, maybe Rory doesn't want to be one, after all. What he wants to do is be there, like he was for his Dad when he hurt his back. He wants to help them and make sure they are comfortable and get better and keep grinning instead of moping like Dad did when Rory wasn't around to keep him company. 

Maybe, if being a nurse is as cool as the Doctor says, Rory wants to be the best nurse ever instead. And hey, the Doctor said boys can be nurses too! 

“Alright, stop bobbing your head before you unhinge your neck,” the Doctor laughs, putting a hand on his head to stop him from nodding anymore. “Right. Do you know Rory Williams?” 

Rory blinks, startled, but the Doctor waits patiently. 

“Uhm. Yes?” 

And the Doctor grins that unbreakable grin once more, eyes bright again. 

“Can you tell me where to find him?” 

“Uhm. Yes?” Rory stammers, but when the Doctor lifts an eyebrow, all the words come out at once. “I mean, yes! Yes, I know! I'm here, it's me, I'm Rory Williams!” 

The Doctor's eyes go wide – and he drops his hand from Rory's head and lets his head fall back. 

“Again! I did it _again!”_ he groans, and Rory frowns in confusion but the Doctor faces him once more before he can think about what to ask. “How old are you?” 

“Eight,” Rory answers, still confused, and this time, it's the Doctor the one to frown – in _fear._

“That's not possible. It shouldn't be this early, this means… The universe is going _fast._ We have far less time than I thought, this isn't how it was supposed to… No, come on, we have to go now,” he tells Rory, tapping at a weird wristband before offering it to him. “Here, put your hand on this and don't let go. We're going to save the universe.” 

Rory grins widely and obeys – and a moment later, the house around them is gone, replaced by a huge cave and a feeling of dizziness as bad as that time Mom had to take him to the hospital because his fever was really high. 

By his side, the Doctor groans and flickers white and blue again, breathing harshly as Rory drops to his butt holding his head to stop the world from _moving._

“ _Oww…_ What happened?” Rory asks, slowly opening his eyes to look around. “And where are we? Is this the basement?” 

“It's the – ugh, give me a moment…” the Doctor groans, bowing his head and taking another deep breath, finally turning solid again. “There, better… I hope we don't have to do that again. Tell you what, if you hang around after we fix my friend, I'll get you back with my spaceship instead. Deal?” he asks, grinning at Rory as he stands up, and Rory gets to his feet so fast that he almost makes himself dizzy again. 

“You have a spaceship?!” 

“I'll take that as a yes,” the Doctor snorts, turning around. “Amelia, I'm – Amelia?!” 

Rory looks around too when the Doctor's grin turns into a terrified face, but he doesn't see anything that could scare him this much. It's just an empty room, with rock columns and _lots_ of dust. 

Of course, as he watches the Doctor pull out a silver thing that lights up yellow with a whir, Rory realizes that maybe the reason he's so scared is because this 'Amelia' girl isn't here. 

“No, I can't have done it again, I can't have – _Two thousand years?!”_ he shouts, looking down at his wand with his face pale and his eyes really wide. “But that – It can't… No, _no._ Focus, I have to focus. Alright, Rory, let's go upstairs. Amy has to be around here somewhere, she's plastic, she's bound to be alive still,” he hisses, walking quickly to the stairs at the end of the room, and Rory hurries to follow him outside, even if he doesn't understand anything else he's just said. 

The moon is in a c-shape in the dark sky, just like it was back home. But they're not in Leadworth anymore, there are only huge rocks standing or lying on the ground around them. It looks a bit like Stonehenge, but it doesn't have any stones standing on other stones. Also, there are a lot of bushes and trees around, and Stonehenge is on a grass field. 

There are some _really_ rusty vans around, but none of them have wheels. The Doctor tells Rory to wait outside anyway as he gets into one, and Rory watches him move his whirring yellow-tipped wand around for a bit before he gets bored and wanders around, trying to see if there's any other way he can help. 

Other than the rocks and old vans, though, there isn't anything interesting – but he still startles when the Doctor barks his name, so he rushes quickly back to the van. 

“I told you to stay here!” 

“I was looking for a way to help…” Rory answers, and the Doctor takes a deep breath as he pinches the bridge of his nose, eyes closed. 

“Look, Rule 1 is to stay close, alright? If you want to travel with me, you _don't_ wander away and you _always_ listen to me, understood?” he explains calmly, but Rory knows that tone from when Dad tries to keep him away from the wires any time he fixes them at home. 

“Alright,” he answers softly, embarrassed, and the Doctor sighs and squeezes his shoulder reassuringly. 

“Good. Now, come on, kid. Let's find Amy,” he tells him, helping him into the passenger seat of the van, and Rory frowns but puts on his safety belt anyway. 

“I'm not supposed to go in the front,” he tells the Doctor when he gets in the driver seat, but the Doctor only checks that his seatbelt is attached properly— 

And the seatbelt moves, wrapping over Rory's chest far more comfortably even as his seat puffs up until he can see over the dashboard without problems. 

He gawks at the Doctor, but the man only grins and points his wand at the van – and it starts up with a soft _hmmm_ and a lot of lights appearing on the dashboard. 

“How did you do that?” 

“I'm the Doctor, kid,” the Doctor answers as he puts his wand back in his pocket and taps on the pattern of lights to turn it into something else. 

“But that wasn't medicine!” 

“I'm not a doctor of medicine, Rory,” the Doctor grins, wiping a hand on the dashboard that makes the lights dim before he grabs the wheel. “I'm a doctor of impossible things.” 

And the van _flies._

Rory lets out a startled squeal, grabbing onto the seat as they float off the ground, higher even than the trees, but as soon as the van takes off into the night, he _laughs._ The Doctor laughs too, taking his eyes off the windshield for just a moment when Rory leans closer to the window, pressing against the glass – before it slides down on its own. 

“This is amazing! You're amazing, Doctor!” he exclaims, pulling his head out of the window as much as the seatbelt lets him, and with the wind on his ears, he misses the Doctor's answer. 

It doesn't take them long at all to get to some kind of giant stadium, leaving a trail of rustling tree tops shivering under the moonlight behind them, and when they stop outside, Rory feels his happiness turn to nervousness. 

There are walls of broken cars all over the parking lot… 

The Doctor is serious when they get out of the van, offering Rory his hand so he can grab it as he guides him inside, his wand in his free hand once more. 

The inside is just as broken as the outside, but with a lot more strange machines too. And skeletons. The Doctor never stops walking, though, pulling Rory along, so it's hard for him to see if they are really human or something else – and he soon finds something more interesting when he recognizes some of the broken cars, anyway. He tries to tell the Doctor about them, but he's hushed gently as the Doctor squeezes his hand. 

“Quiet now, Rory. You can tell me about the cars later, but now we need to be quiet.” 

“Oh…” Rory whispers, grimacing, and the Doctor stops and looks at Rory. 

“Hey. I promise I'll listen to you tell me all about the cars later. Just, not now, alright?” he repeats, and Rory blinks up at him before grinning widely. 

“You promise? Pinky promise?” he asks, and the Doctor grins and lets go of Rory's hand to offer his pinky. 

“Pinky promise.” 

They shake pinkies before Rory grabs his hand once more, and this time, he feels more relaxed as they walk past the broken walls and cars and stuff Rory can't recognize. 

“What do you think happened here?” he asks softly after a moment, as they go around a big chunk of ceiling that crashed to the ground, moonlight illuminating everything. 

“Well, the universe ended. The Roman Empire had nowhere to expand into, it suddenly found itself reduced to a single planet. My guess is that they turned against themselves, waged war on each other for resources that were suddenly insufficient. Or maybe humanity evolved down a completely different path. I don't know and, frankly, I don't exactly care either. I just want to find Amy and the Pandorica and make sure this never happens in the first place.” 

“I don't think I understand,” Rory confesses, frowning, but the Doctor grins reassuringly. 

“Don't worry. You will, in time.” 

And then, they find a door. Or, well, _some kind_ of door. The Doctor waves his wand over it, and there are some clicks and whines of machines as it opens slowly, but they don't move. 

“Stay behind me, alright?” the Doctor tells Rory, pushing him at his back as he approaches the doors, and Rory nods, scared once more. 

However, when they finally get inside, Rory relaxes. The place is as empty as everywhere else, with a bunch of broken machines he doesn't recognize, some weird statues to one side, and a huge stone box with a circle on each of its sides— 

“That looks like Pandora's box,” he tells the Doctor, pointing at the box, and the Doctor lets Rory's hand go as he approaches it. 

“It's the Pandorica. They made it using the idea of Pandora's box,” he explains softly, resting a hand on the stone even as he looks around with a frown. 

“Does it hold bad things too?” Rory asks, and the Doctor startles, turning to look at Rory in surprise. 

“What? No! No, it's… They made it a prison, to keep a monster in it, but there's no monster in there. There's just a friend of mine, the nurse I told you about. He got hurt, and the only way to keep him safe was to put him in here. And there was someone else here, to take care of the box while I was gone, but she's…” the Doctor whispers, going silent and taking his hand off the Pandorica to look sadly at the soot on his hand. “Come here, Rory. I need you to put your hand on the Pandorica.” 

“What for?” Rory asks, but he remembers the rules and approaches the box. 

… It looks a lot bigger up close… 

“Because only you can help my friend. The Pandorica will do the healing, but it needs to know how you work so it can fix him right,” the Doctor explains, taking a step back as Rory gets closer. 

“Couldn't it get it from you? You touched it too.” 

The Doctor grins. 

“I'm not human.” 

Rory looks at him with wide eyes, before he remembers the Doctor telling him he is a ghost with a spaceship. Well, he's some kind of alien then. Mystery solved. 

So, Rory grins, takes a deep breath, turns to the box and nods. And then, he remembers what the Doctor said, about how doctors fix things but nurses care about people, and how the Doctor could do things his human friend could never do, while his human friend could do things the Doctor couldn't. 

This is one of the things _Rory_ can do that the Doctor never could. 

And he'll do it _right._

So, he lifts his hand and presses it against the rock, all his fingers digging into it, asking the box to fix the Doctor's friend, and even when he feels and hears it tremble, he doesn't move— 

Until the Doctor grabs him from the collar of his jacket and pulls him away. 

“Good job, Rory! You've done it!” he congratulates, keeping his hands on his shoulders, and Rory tilts his head up to grin widely at him— 

And the Pandorica opens with a bright light. When Rory blinks, he sees a man sitting inside, held back by a lot of metallic cuffs, and blinking at them in confusion. 

“Doctor? What happened? How did I get in here? Where's _here?”_

“Welcome back, Rory Williams! You're in the Pandorica, in the year 14010, and you got in there because you were shot by your fiancée. Oh, and this is Kid Rory, he saved your life. Now, get out of there so we can fix the universe before it's erased completely,” the Doctor answers happily, and Rory is _confused._

“He has the same name as me,” he comments, blinking up at the Doctor, whose grin seems to widen. 

“Kid, he _is_ you. Future you. You're going to be _magnificent.”_

“I don't understand,” Rory and Big Rory say together as Big Rory gets out of the Pandorica, and the Doctor chuckles— 

“Exterminate!” a robotic voice exclaims, and the Doctor immediately pushes Rory behind him, taking out his wand once more— 

One of the rock statues that looks like a peppershaker robot starts moving, sliding closer and twitching its arms, with its ears lighting up as it speaks – or, at least, Rory thinks they do, it's a bit hard to tell with the Pandorica's light falling on it. 

“What's that?” Big Rory asks, stepping closer to them. 

“Exterminate, exterminate! Weapons systems restoring.” 

“A Dalek,” the Doctor answers before he grabs Rory's hand and runs away from the 'Dalek'. “Come along, Rorys!” 

And they run, Big Rory following them, out of the wall around the Pandorica and into the rest of the broken stadium. 

“Where are we going?” Big Rory asks as they hear the _exterminate!_ from the robot as it follows them. 

“Somewhere I'll have a brilliant plan that'll get us out of this mess,” the Doctor hisses as they rush into another walled area. “The Dalek is damaged, though it's _somehow_ still functional. Maybe we can confuse it,” he hisses, reaching for some dusty gray rags, throwing one on Rory and putting another on as a cape, pulling up the big hood on it. “What do you think? No, stupid, don't answer. Let's see if we can find some functional laser gladius,” he adds, ignoring the Rorys' confused looks as he rummages through another pile. 

“What's going on?” a voice asks as a shadow steps from behind more broken machines, shining a torch on them – just as the Dalek slips out of the Pandorica's place. 

“Get out of here. Run!” the Doctor shouts, trying to put down the stuff he'd been fiddling with. 

“Drop the device!” the Dalek orders, and Rory hides behind a box when the Doctor gestures at him to, pushing Big Rory behind another one. 

“Don't touch each other, we don't need a paradox on top of everything else,” he hisses at them when Big Rory reaches for Rory, before he turns to the Dalek. “It's not a weapon! Scan it, it's not a weapon, and you don't have the power to waste,” he tells the Dalek, whose 'eye' twitches for a moment. 

“Scans indicate intruder unarmed.” 

The stranger lets the torch fall and pulls down the hood – and long red hair falls around her pretty face and big grin. 

“Think again,” she says as she holds her hand up, fingers pointing at the Dalek— 

Her fingers fall down, revealing a gun inside her hand – and she shoots and smoke comes out of the Dalek's eye. 

“Vision impaired!” it shouts, twitching around wildly. “Vision…” 

And it stops. 

The Doctor sighs before grinning widely, and Rory gets out from behind the box to stand at his side. 

“Amy,” Big Rory whispers when he sees the gun-hand girl, and her grin turns to tears, strangely enough. 

“Rory!” she shouts, and when Big Rory runs to her, she rushes to meet him halfway into a big hug. 

They talk to each other too softly for Rory to catch, but when he turns to the Doctor and sees him grinning, he decides it's about good stuff. So, he pulls on the Doctor's sleeve. 

“Can we go to your spaceship now?” he asks, and the Doctor snorts before turning serious. 

“Yeah, Kid. We'll go find my spaceship now,” he answers, approaching the two other grownups who are – kissing? “Alright, Ponds, split up and breathe. We've got things to take care of before you can celebrate.” 

They separate for a second, and Rory is _sure_ they'll ignore the Doctor and go back to kissing before the girl actually sees the Doctor and steps away from Big Rory. 

“You!” 

… Uh oh. 

“Amy—” 

“I know I said you're never on time anywhere, but this is ridiculous! I waited for _two thousand years!_ Oh, and I stayed away from fire when the raids started, but you never said anything about not being able to sleep! I thought I would go mad!” she shouts at the Doctor, stepping closer even as he steps back, hands held up. 

“Amelia—” 

“Don't _Amelia_ me, Raggedy Man! I had to keep moving the Pandorica because everyone thought it was the best thing since the laser gladius, and then everyone started growing old and dying and I was left all alone with only the statues and – and how do you—” she adds, though this time there are tears in her eyes, and when the Doctor hugs her, Amy clings to him like Rory does Mom after a nightmare. 

“Oh, Amy, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I never meant for this to happen. The universe is collapsing faster than I thought, I… I miscalculated. I'm sorry. But we have to move now, we have to stop the collapse or there won't be time for tears or hugs anymore,” the Doctor apologizes, running his fingers through her hair, but Amy doesn't look like she wants to let go. 

“Doctor – Doctor, the Dalek is moving again! How can it still _move?!”_ Big Rory shouts, grabbing onto Amy, and _that_ finally makes them separate. 

“It was there in the Pandorica's chamber when they locked me inside, but it should've been erased with the rest of the universe. That can't be a coincidence,” the Doctor hisses, looking back as he grabs Rory's hand to guide him away – and stopping in shock. “The light from the Pandorica. It's hitting the Dalek,” he whispers, and Rory looks back to see that, yes, a bit of the light from the box is shining on the Dalek. “Out. Out, everyone _out!”_ he shouts, running away from the Dalek through a different door in the wall of broken machines. “Amy, you know this mess, get us somewhere higher!” he tells Amy as he pushes Rory further ahead and grabs a rusted spear to block the door. 

“The hasta!” Amy shouts, startling them as she reaches for the Doctor. “That's how you looked when you gave me the screwdriver!” 

That doesn't make sense to Rory, but it must mean something for the Doctor, because he stops, eyes wide, and turns to frown at his weird wristband, muttering under his breath – and vanishes with a crackle of electricity. 

Rory only has time to blink before he reappears and actually leaves the spear in the doorway, using his wand to make it crackle with electricity, before he vanishes again. 

“How does he do that? Is it because he's an alien?” he asks Big Rory, who sighs but gives him a grin. 

“The vanishing? Yes. The fixing stuff? That's because he's the Doctor.” 

The Doctor reappears before Rory can make his mind about which is cooler, and immediately gets up to Big Rory and takes his wand out of _Big Rory's_ jacket's inner pocket. 

“Uh…” 

“Less gawking, more running!” the Doctor tells them, pocketing the wand and taking off once more while they scramble to follow. 

“How did he do _that?”_ Rory asks again, but this time, it's Amy the one who answers with a chuckle. 

“He's the Doctor.” 

* * *

Amy is torn between slapping the Doctor, kissing Rory again, or hugging the Doctor so hard his head pops off. Maybe all three of them. 

Also, she'd forgotten how _cute_ Rory was when he was young. He's, what, seven? Eight? Why did the Doctor bring kid Rory here instead of adult Rory? Is it the same reason he took two thousand years to get back to Amy? 

… Probably. 

Right, focus. Fix the universe first, snog her fiancé and hug the Doctor to death later. 

“If we go this way, we'll get to the maintenance tunnels that lead to the roof of the stadium. Where, exactly, are we going?” she tells them, guiding them through the labyrinth that has become her home of the last two thousand years. 

“To the roof,” the Doctor answers with a grin, slipping past her as they finally see the doorway that will lead them to the tunnels— 

And the Doctor appears in front of them with a crackle of lightning, missing the ragged cape that is over his shoulders now and with his clothes smoking – and collapses. 

The present Doctor rushes to him at that, snapping out of his shock, and Amy is quick to follow. 

He looks bad, 1941 bad, a trickle of blood slipping past his lips and scorch marks on his skin, clothes burnt on his chest— 

His eyes are opened just a sliver, and when he sees the present Doctor lean over him, he smiles in _relief._

He whispers something in that overlapping language that they think is Gallifreyan, and when Rory makes to reach for him, the present Doctor lifts a hand to stop him. 

Not that it's needed. As soon as he does, the future Doctor stops talking and slumps with a sigh, eyes closed and chest terrifyingly still. 

“Are you…?” Amy whispers, looking from the charred Doctor's face to the present Doctor's back. “I mean, is he, is he dead?” 

“He is,” the Doctor answers with a whisper, before shaking his head and getting back to his feet. “Of course he's dead. But I still have twelve minutes. Let's move.” 

“Twelve minutes to live? Can we stop whatever kills you in just twelve minutes?” Rory asks, shaking his head, as he finally wrenches his gaze away from the immobile Doctor on the floor. 

“Oh, there's a lot that can be done in twelve minutes. Like getting to the roof, for starters. Come on, chop chop!” he scowls, making for the door again— 

“We can't leave you here!” Amy shouts, standing stubbornly next to the dead— _oh God no—_ Doctor. 

The present Doctor stops, takes a breath, and turns around. He's serious, focused, but Amy doesn't step down, meeting his eyes with an unspoken challenge in hers. 

They'll change this, of course they will, but that doesn't mean she can – she can't just leave him here, even if they'll make it so that it never happens in the first place. 

“So, you'd rather leave Kid Rory for dead?” he asks, and Amy startles before she swivels in place— 

Kid Rory is gone. 

“What happened to me?” Rory squeaks, looking around frantically, even as Amy turns to the Doctor pleadingly. 

“Nothing. You never existed in the first place, and you never will. History is collapsing. And before you ask, we're all anomalies. We're all just hanging on at the eye of the storm, that's why we're still here, along that Dalek. But if we don't do something fast, reality will never have happened. Now, roof, come on!” he explains, and this time, when he makes for the tunnels, no one stops him. 

However, no one follows him either. 

“Time can be rewritten,” Rory whispers, swallowing, as he wraps a hand around her own. “He'll find a way to save himself, there's no way we're letting him get killed.” 

“No. No, there's no way he's dying on our watch,” Amy agrees, but she takes off her cape and covers the dead Doctor with it anyway. 

When they finally follow, they find the Doctor has managed to not only find the lifts, but also to fix one enough that they don't need to walk the gazillion steps that would take them to the roof, and so they make the trip in no time at all – and are received by the sun shining down on them. 

“It's morning already? How did that happen?” Amy asks, looking around as the Doctor makes a beeline for the closest radio array. 

“Pay attention, Ponds! The universe is collapsing, history is shrinking. I told you already!” he chastises them before he plucks the satellite dish off its stand. 

“Why do New Romans need satellite dishes?” Rory asks, dumbfounded, as they stare as the Doctor sonics the dish. 

“They don't, but they like it. It's retro,” Amy answers with a shrug, before she hears the Doctor's voice in the back of her head telling her to focus. “Doctor, what are you doing?” 

“I'm looking for the TARDIS.” 

“But the TARDIS exploded.” 

“I'm looking for _an exploding_ TARDIS.” 

“Wait, the TARDIS _exploded?”_

“It did, and it took the universe with it,” Amy answers with a grimace, and Rory's disbelief turns into confusion. 

“But… Why? _How?”_

“Save the universe first, figure out how to keep it from exploding again later,” the Doctor answers with a scoff, sending them a look over his shoulder as he aims the dish at the sun. “Better question – in a universe where no star ever existed, what do you call _that?”_

Obligingly, they look at where he's gesturing with the screwdriver, and both Amy and Rory exchange a confused look. 

“The sun?” Amy asks, and Rory's eyebrows jump to his hairline. 

“Since when is the sun so _big?_ Or so close to Earth?” 

“Excellent points! Answer? Since it isn't a sun,” the Doctor tells them, sonicking the dish— 

And they hear the TARDIS' whooshing all around them. 

Amy thinks back to Starship UK and the Star Whale's screams, and gulps, fighting back the overwhelming wave of sadness that washes over her at the realization that _he's been hearing this all along._ This, his beloved ship, the only thing he has left of his people and planet, blowing up while he can do _nothing_ to stop it. 

_Oh, Doctor…_

“So, the TARDIS has been keeping the Earth warm while burning everything else?” Rory asks, once more in disbelief, but Amy frowns, concentrating on the noise. 

That… doesn't sound right. It's almost like— 

_Prisoner Zero has escaped._

Yes, almost like _then,_ but that's not what she's hearing now, it's… 

“Doctor, there's something else,” she tells him before he can get lost in end-of-the-universe mechanics, and Amy receives two confused frowns before the Doctor turns back to the dish and his screwdriver. 

“I can't hear anything,” Rory whispers, and Amy gives him a grin. 

“Trust the plastic. There's something else there, something almost like—” 

“Oh Doctor, I'm sorry. Oh Doctor, I'm sorry. Oh Doctor, I'm sorry.” 

“River!” both Amy and Rory exclaim at the same time, and the Doctor stares at the exploding TARDIS in surprise for a second before putting the dish down with a start. 

“Of course! The emergency protocols, that must be it. The TARDIS has sealed off the control room and put River into a time loop to save her. Oh, she's _clever!_ River's right at the heart of the explosion, but she's still _alive._ I can save her!” he answers happily, grinning widely as he taps the Vortex manipulator— 

And vanishes. 

Amy and Rory don't have the chance to do more than exchange a look before the Doctor is back with River, and Amy immediately exchanges a relieved grin with Rory. 

“Rory! And the plastic centurion?” River exclaims, watching them with wide eyes as the Doctor takes a step away from her. 

“It's okay, she's on our side. Long story, I'll tell you once we don't have a burning universe to worry about,” he tells her, making for the door – and River grabs the cape and pulls him short with a chocked exclamation of surprise. 

“A cape? Really? At least wear armor with it!” she mocks as the Doctor unlatches it with a scowl, blushing, before they all resume their trek downstairs. 

“Oh, totally agreed,” Amy hums, exchanging a grin with a pleasantly startled River, and Rory rolls his eyes as he looks at the Doctor, who is trying _really_ hard to ignore them all. 

“Do I want to know?” 

“Universe first, stories later! Pay attention!” he scolds them as they reach the elevator— 

“Exterminate!” a robotic voice shouts at their backs, and they all whirl around to see a Dalek levitate into view. 

“How is it—” 

“Get in!” the Doctor shouts, and they all hurry to obey, crouching to avoid the shots and to keep their balance when the elevator plummets down faster than it's supposed to when the Doctor sonics it, leaving the Dalek outside. “Right, where were we? Oh, yes, stories. Need I remind you we have a Dalek to deal with on top of the collapse of the universe?” he adds more calmly, almost conversationally, earning himself three pairs of glares that he answers with an angelical smile. 

“And how is _that_ possible? Doctor, the Daleks never existed. How can a creature that never existed be suddenly alive?” River asks, and when the Doctor grins knowingly, she opens her mouth again. 

“You said it got touched by the light of the Pandorica,” Rory interrupts as he finally recovers his balance, straightening with the help of Amy's hand on his arm. 

“It's not a light, it's a restoration field. It's what brought you back, with the genetic scan it took from Kid Rory. But that's the thing, it needed _something_ to bring you back, it couldn't do it from nothing. So, it needed something to restore a Dalek – and it had it.” 

“How?” Amy, Rory and River ask at once, and the Doctor's grin turns _triumphant._

“It's the perfect prison,” he answers as he spreads his hands, like a magician showing off a trick onstage. “It closed before the total event collapse, with me inside and, oh, a few _billion_ atoms of the universe as it was. Which means we have exactly what we need to reboot the universe – we just need to extrapolate it from what the Pandorica preserved.” 

“Like, what, cloning a body from a single cell?” Rory asks, wide-eyed, and a little bit less confused than Amy, apparently. 

“Exactly like that! Well, no, not like that. Well, a bit like that—” 

“Doctor, you're doing it again,” Amy cuts before he can finish that thought, and the Doctor blinks at her in surprise before grimacing. 

“Right, thanks. Anyway, that's about right, Rory. We've got the map of how the universe should be, and the means to transmit that information.” 

“Except all that gets us is a partially restored Dalek. The Pandorica won't be able to reboot the whole of reality,” River points out, frowning in confusion, and this time, the Doctor's grin is expectant as he leans close to her. 

“What if we give it a moment of infinite power? What if we could transmit the Pandorica's light to every particle of space and time _simultaneously?”_

“Well, that would be lovely, dear, but we can't, because it's completely impossible.” 

“That's my middle name.” 

“You don't have a middle name.” 

“Don't I?” the Doctor asks mockingly, lifting an eyebrow, and River pokes him on the forehead to get him away from her at last, though she's grinning as widely as Amy and Rory. “Alright, I don't, but we _can_ reboot the universe. It's _almost_ completely impossible, but we can do it. One spark is all we need,” he answers as the elevator finally slows down, almost at ground floor. 

“It really wasn't a coincidence, was it? The Dalek coming to life after I did. Huh. Guess you _were_ right. Never ignore a coincidence,” Rory huffs with a huge grin as the elevator stops and they step off. 

“Unless you're running for your life!” the Doctor adds knowingly, taking off in a run towards the main exhibition dome— 

And jerking with a silent scream as the Dalek shoots him right in the chest, collapsing a second after. 

“ _DOCTOR!”_

It's like the world has stopped, even as Amy pushes Rory behind a display more out of training than an actual wish to do so. River drops to her knees by the Doctor's side, screaming his name, completely ignoring the Dalek powering down, and he twitches, still wracked by the energy killing him – and slaps a hand on the Vortex manipulator and _vanishes._

 _Twelve minutes,_ the Doctor said. But what he never said, even when they asked, was whether he was going to stop his own death. It was them, Amy and Rory, who said they could prevent it, that they could change history. 

But they didn't. The Doctor was too focused on saving them, on saving River, on telling them _how_ they could save the universe, to save himself. And now he's dead. 

_“One spark is all we need.”_

And there's nothing they can do about it. 

“Where did he go? Damn it, he could be anywhere,” River hisses, looking around, and Amy swallows as she steps away from Rory to approach her. 

“We found him twelve minutes ago,” she answers, voice soft to try to hold her own tears at bay. “But he's dead, River.” 

“I _refuse_ to believe that stubborn bastard is dead. And so should you. The day the Doctor dies, you'll _know.”_

“The whole universe is dying. What bigger sign could we need?” Rory whispers as he joins them— 

The Dalek starts twitching again. 

“Systems restoring. You will be exterminated,” it proclaims, and Amy immediately grabs Rory's arm to drag him away and turns to River. 

“We've got to move; it's coming back to life!” 

“You go to the Doctor. I'll be right with you.” 

“We don't know how to fix stuff the way you do!” Amy tells her, but River pushes her away with a strength she hadn't expected. 

“Just _go!_ And tell the Doctor that I'll kill him myself if he dares to die on me!” 

Amy swallows and finally obeys, grabbing Rory's hand to guide him to where they left the Doctor's body through a roundabout path, since the Dalek is blocking their way. 

And if her plastic-enhanced ears catch the sound of a Dalek begging for mercy and the echo of a shot, Amy holds onto her burning satisfaction and tries to keep a smirk at bay. 

What she _can't_ withhold, however, is her gasp of surprise as they reach the spot where they left the dead Doctor only to find just her abandoned cape. 

“How could he have moved? He was dead. Doctor? Doctor!” Rory shouts, looking around, and a moment later, River shows up through the main path. 

“He was dead,” Amy whispers as River puts her gun back in its holster. 

“Who told you that?” she asks, looking at Rory, but he shakes his head. 

“The Doctor did.” 

River's serious expression cracks and Amy sees _fear_ once more. 

“Then we better find him fast.” 

So, they run to the Pandorica, hoping to find him there – and they do. He's sitting inside the box, a bunch of stripped cables connected to his Vortex manipulator as he slumps into the seat, opening one eye to look at them and with his lips twitching minutely into what is supposed to be a smile. 

Amy rushes to him, calling his name, with the other two close behind. 

“Why did you tell us you were dead?” Rory hisses, checking his pulse and with his anger turning to worry as he looks over him. 

“We were a diversion. As long as the Dalek was trying to catch us, he could work down here,” Amy whispers, looking at the mess that is now the Vortex manipulator. 

Rory steps back, grimacing and wringing his hands, and River takes his spot as she tries to talk to the Doctor, while Amy takes her fiancé aside. 

“How bad is it?” 

Rory just shakes his head, looking at her pleadingly, and if Amy had a stomach, she's sure it would have fallen to the ground. 

She's about to ask him to elaborate when a flash of orange light through the half-collapsed ceiling catches her attention. The 'sun' is getting brighter. 

“What's happening?” Rory asks, and even River takes a step away from the Doctor and the Pandorica to see what's going on. 

“Reality's collapsing. It's speeding up,” River whispers, and Amy looks around to see that half the supplies that filled her little refuge have vanished without a trace, the people who invented them no longer having existed. 

“History's being erased,” she whispers, remembering the Doctor's words, and River turns to the Pandorica once more, looking at the Vortex manipulator. 

“Doctor, what were you doing? How can we help? Doctor!” 

He grins softly, opening his eyes the tiniest bit once more, and Amy and Rory move closer to try and catch his words. 

“Lamia's prophecy,” he whispers, before closing his eyes once more, still breathing but apparently unconscious. 

“Lamia's prophecy?” River repeats, turning to Rory – whose eyes widen. 

“The blinding light of the fake star heralds the end of time. One forgets, one remembers, one burns in a box. To save one life, to save one world, to save it all… the Doctor must burn,” Rory recites, memory fresher than Amy's without two thousand years trying to survive in a collapsed universe as a plastic centurion. 

But as soon as the words are out, Amy remembers the Doctor laughing at a prophecy about the past – and how _wrong_ they had all been. 

“You forgot,” Amy points out, looking at Rory, who nods slowly. 

“But you remembered, even though you should've been dead.” 

“And River was burning in the TARDIS—” 

“—which we all thought was a star, but isn't.” 

“And to save everyone, the Doctor must burn,” River finishes, heartbroken, as she looks at the unconscious alien slumped in the Pandorica's seat. “Oh, Sweetie…” 

“What do you mean? Why must he burn? I mean, he's a bit charred from the Dalek shot, but—” 

“That's not what it means,” River cuts before Amy can degrade into a nonsensical rant, looking up at the sky through the cracks in the ceiling. “The TARDIS is still burning. It's exploding at every point in history. If you threw the Pandorica into the explosion, right into the heart of the fire…” 

“Then what?” Amy asks, stepping closer as she tries to strangle the fear trying to claw up her throat. 

“Then let there be light,” River whispers before turning to them, realization in her eyes rather than whatever Amy had been expecting. “The light from the Pandorica would explode everywhere at once, just like he said.” 

“That would work? That would bring everything back?” Rory asks, wide-eyed, as he looks to Amy and tries to hold her gaze meaningfully while Amy is still trying to figure out a way to stomp the dread in her non-existing stomach into oblivion. 

“A restoration field powered by an exploding TARDIS, happening at every moment in history. Oh, that's brilliant. It might even work. He's wired the Vortex manipulator to the rest of the box.” 

And Amy manages to choke out the most important word she could ever ask, the _only_ word that matters right now. 

“Why?” 

River knows too. That's why she meets Amy's eyes and doesn't bother sugarcoating anything. 

“So he can take it with him. He's going to fly the Pandorica into the heart of the explosion.” 

* * *

They're sitting on something that Rory doesn't bother identifying, staring at the light from the exploding TARDIS growing redder and brighter. Not a word is spoken. 

Rory feels… very conflicted. On the one hand, he's _elated_ to have Amy back and remember her, even if she's plastic. Which… is actually kind of hot, the whole armor and gun-hand and everything, if he's honest with himself. Even if that same gun-hand shot him dead two thousand years ago. 

Is it weird that _that_ isn't weird? 

… For people who are _not_ them, it's probably weird. Right, whatever. 

On the other hand, though, Rory feels _heartbroken._ They're going to fix the universe, but… The Doctor dies. If they save the universe, the Doctor dies. If they _don't_ save the universe, everyone dies. So, really, the only option is to save the universe… 

But Rory doesn't want the Doctor to die. Who would want that? If anyone were to meet the Doctor, how could they want him dead? 

… Okay, wrong question. Who would want the Doctor to _actually_ die, not just strangle him a little bit every now and then? 

Other than, of course, the Daleks and the Cybermen and all those others that went and put him in the Pandorica, which ended up killing them all anyway. Though… well, judging by the Pandorica's legend about the creature imprisoned in it, Rory can't exactly blame them. The Doctor is _terrifying_ for those who end on his bad side, and he is most definitely unstoppable, with and without TARDIS and screwdriver and anything else, except for this one hiccup. So, yes, Rory can understand why his enemies would fear him as much as to lock him up in the perfect prison, but at the same time… 

The Daleks would destroy everything. The Cybermen prey on humans. The Atraxi had no qualms about destroying a world to capture one escaped inmate. From Rory's point of view, and all of humanity's, the Doctor is the good guy. He probably is for most of the universe, really, seeing how some of those aliens behaved. But there's no such thing as a good guy _for everyone._

And judging by that mention of the Doctor destroying Gallifrey during the Time War, that he even _took active part_ in it, and all that 'bloodier hands in the galaxy' and 'warrior' thing… It's obvious they don't know everything about the Doctor, that they barely know _anything_ about him. 

But what Rory does know is that, under all the thorns, he's a decent man who tries to do what's best for everyone he comes across – even his enemies. Always give everyone a chance to surrender and change, after all. So, if everyone tried to be good and decent, no one would ever have a problem with the Doctor. 

Of course, that will never happen, it's too idealistic, and Rory knows better than to believe such a thing regardless of how much he'd like it to be true, but still. 

He does _not_ want the Doctor to die just because he tried to do the right thing. He doesn't want him to lose what little he has left after the destruction of his people and planet just so that the rest of the universe can go back to killing each other again. 

Still, regardless of how bad Rory feels, Amy… 

Amy is bound to feel even _worse._ Rory has only known the Doctor for a bit over two years, and that's with a two-year absence between their first meeting and actually traveling together. But Amy met the Doctor when she was seven, spent twelve years holding onto his memory, holding onto his promise even when she started denying his existence, and then he appeared in her life again. And again, two years later, and they traveled on their own for a bit before Rory joined them. 

And now, here they are, waiting for the Doctor to finish preparing his own deathtrap. 

“Are you okay?” Rory asks Amy, resting his hand on hers and feeling her tremble. 

“Are you?” she asks back, and Rory deflates. 

“No.” 

“Well, shut up then!” she snaps, but a moment later, she turns her hand to lace her fingers with his. “I'm sorry.” 

“That's fine. I kind of want to shut myself up too,” he answers nonchalantly, and Amy huffs and drops her head on his shoulder. 

She feels warm, real, despite the plastic, and Rory finally realizes that he doesn't care anymore if the only way to get Amy back is as a plastic centurion. Not that he ever cared about the centurion part of that statement to begin with. 

“Amy, Rory,” River calls, approaching them with an obvious weight on her shoulders. “He wants to talk to you.” 

They stand up, hands still laced together, but instead of walking to the Pandorica, Amy stays in place. 

“So, what happens here? Rebooting the universe. What happens to us?” 

_What happens to me, and me-and-Rory,_ Rory hears, and that thought about Amy being plastic rears its ugly head once more. 

River takes a breath, composing herself, before she can give them a half grin. 

“We all wake up where we ought to be. None of this ever happens and we don't remember it.” 

“And Amy? Will she still be plastic?” Rory asks, and this time, River's grin is happier. 

“No, she won't. She will have never died to begin with.” 

“I will have never traveled with the Doctor to begin with,” Amy corrects, and River's smile and Rory's relief vanish at the words. “Tell me he comes back too.” 

This time, River doesn't even try to put together a smile. 

“The Doctor will be the heart of the explosion.” 

“So?” 

“So all the cracks in time will close, but he'll be on the wrong side, trapped in the never-space, the void between the worlds. All memory of him will be purged from the universe. He will never have been born. Now, please. He wants to talk to you before he goes,” River explains, more urgent now, and Rory feels the knot in his throat tighten again. 

“Not you?” Amy asks, and this time, River's smile is clearly sad. 

“He doesn't really know me yet. Now, he never will.” 

She doesn't say more, simply gesturing towards the Pandorica once more, and Rory squeezes Amy's hand and leads her to the box even though his feet feel as heavy as concrete. 

“Hi,” Amy calls as they approach, and the Doctor, who had been leaning lifelessly against the seat, opens his eyes halfway and smiles at them. 

“Amy and Rory. The girl who waited and the boy who searched. Was it worth it?” he asks with a rasp, and Rory's throat tightens at what he doesn't say. 

He's not asking if the trip was worth it to find each other again, he _knows_ it was. The Doctor was the one who turned them into 'the girl who waited and the boy who searched', so the whole thing wouldn't have happened if they hadn't met him. No, what he's asking is if _the Doctor_ was worth the trip. 

“Shut up,” Amy scolds, but she's smiling in the way that both Rory and the Doctor know she doesn't mean it. 

“Of course it was,” Rory translates just in case, and the Doctor's smile twitches into something slightly bigger. 

“I asked you why you came with me.” 

“Yes, I remember,” Rory answers, not unbothered by interrupting because the Doctor sounds just so _tired._

“Amy?” 

“Well, you promised me a trip,” she answers, grinning, and the Doctor's eyes soften. 

“ _One_ trip.” 

“Yeah, well… It doesn't matter now,” she answers with a shrug, all her mischief lost under the impending doom hanging over their heads – _the Doctor's_ head. 

“Of course it does. You said you wanted me to… walk you down the aisle. And your house… it's too big.” 

“Look at you, mocking my house for being too big. Have you seen your ship?” Amy retorts, and Rory can't help but snort alongside the two of them— 

And reach for the Doctor when he seems to choke on his next breath, grimacing. 

“You should rest. If we can get this done for you, then the TARDIS can—” 

“Nothing,” the Doctor cuts, glaring him into silence, and Rory immediately takes his hands off the Doctor's singular pulse. “It has… it has to be me. Because you two… you have your own jobs to do.” 

“We do?” Amy and Rory ask in unison, and the Doctor grins again. 

“Your parents, Amy. Where did they go?” he asks, and Amy frowns. 

“They – I… I don't—” 

Rory takes her hand once more, but it isn't until the Doctor's soft shushing that Amy fully focuses once more. 

“It's okay… It's not your fault,” he tells her, and Amy clutches Rory's hand tighter in preparation for whatever the Doctor is about to say. “The crack in your wall. It was eating away at your life for a long time. But nothing is ever forgotten. Not really. You just have to try.” 

“Doctor! It's speeding up!” River calls, her tiny computer in hand and worry in her eyes. 

They don't have much time left. But when he turns to the Doctor, Rory sees him far more focused than before and knows it'll be useless trying to get something that is not 'the mission' out of him. 

Part of him is glad to see it, to see the Doctor is still himself after this last chaotic adventure and all the pain he must be in right now. But the bigger part fears that if they don't say what they want now, they won't have a chance ever again. 

Amy puts the Doctor's screwdriver back in his pocket, but when she makes to move away, he grabs her hand to hold her in place. 

“The universe is going to come back. All of it. Try to remember your family and they'll be there.” 

“How can I remember them if they never existed?” she asks, and the Doctor's focus slips the tiniest bit to let through a proud smile. 

“Memories are more powerful than you think,” he whispers, and Rory feels Amy tense in realization. 

“But I _can't_ remember them.” 

“But Rory can remember _you.”_

“Me?” Rory asks, surprised even more by Amy's hopeful smile than by the words. 

“You have to remember her, Rory. Like you did until now, but _consciously_ this time,” the Doctor tells him with a grin, and Rory hesitates before finally rolling his eyes, because _really._ “Remember her, and she can remember her parents. And then, have that wedding. Love each other. Be _magnificent.”_

“But what about you?” Amy asks with tears in her eyes, and Rory swallows again but doesn't manage to dislodge whatever is caught in his throat. 

“You won't need an imaginary friend anymore. Oh, look at you. My Ponds, crying over little old me, huh?” he mocks them, sighing and leaning a bit more on the chair before he manages to smile at them again. “Thank you, Amy and Rory.” 

The Pandorica closes. 

River calls them back, away from the Pandorica's wobbly ascent, and the three of them can only stare in silence as the box lifts higher into the sky, towards the gigantic sun threatening to engulf all of reality. 

And then, when the light is too much for his eyes anymore, Rory buries his face in Amy's hair and thinks about her, about the red-haired spunky girl that transferred to his class, about her stories of the Raggedy Doctor and their games, about hide-and-seek and Halloween pranks, about snacks in her home while they ran around the garden, about helping her sew dolls with the excuse of practicing his stitching for his future career as a nurse, about her smile and her eyes and her humor and her hand in his and her lips— 

He thinks of red wallpaper with curls of gold and a crazy alien in a blue box, and Amy dressed like a Roman goddess. He thinks of them on a pier in Sicily, curling on a couch in a secret base under Cardiff with a sick alien on their laps, souvenir shopping for a shirt funny enough for the Doctor, a ring glinting in the caverns under London, sharing stories of the Lord of the Rings with the man who would inspire them all— 

Rory thinks of Amy leaning against an alien console, tossing her hair back with that gorgeous smirk as she jokes with— 

* * *

The Doctor sits up with a gasp, immediately checking his body to make sure he _really_ has all his limbs attached. 

He does. Moreover, he does and he is _not_ in pain. And his clothes are as good as new. Huh. 

He could've sworn he was about to die; he had made peace with it even – and only now does he realize how _stupid_ that had been, dying without bringing the actual Doctor back or with the mess with River still pending. 

He _can't_ die yet! 

… But it's still surprising that he _didn't_ die when he brought the Pandorica into the TARDIS' explosion and _opened it._ He knew it would be risky, but he was the only one with the knowledge to do it. And, to be fair, he was already dead by then. 

People always get it wrong with Time Lords. They take _forever_ to die. Dying properly can take days. Even if they're too injured to regenerate, or if they have no regenerations left, every cell in a Time Lord's body will keep trying – which is why they burn. A Time Lord doesn't die because their body gives up, like it happens with humans. No, a Time Lord dies because their body _doesn't_ give up. It keeps trying to regenerate, burning what little the Time Lord has left until, at the very end, the body burns itself up, leaving nothing but golden dust and singed robes behind. 

The Doctor isn't sure how this body of his would've reacted – he has an _excellent_ metabolic control, good enough to completely suppress his regeneration when he was Harold Saxon, but this body is… _patchy._ A failed resurrection, a different Time Lord's regeneration energy infused into it to heal it, but now, after all the bumps and scratches he's given it on its short run… Now, this body of his is once more clamoring for energy he won't give it. 

He has to wonder what would've happened if the old Doctor hadn't given him his regeneration energy. Would his body have eventually burnt up, like a proper Time Lord's? Would it have consumed itself slowly, like his original did once he ran out of regenerations, leaving only a walking corpse behind? 

The Doctor gets up slowly, making sure everything is actually working properly, and frowns at his own hands. 

No, there was no other option, not for him. Either die saving the universe, saving _Amy and Rory and River,_ or send one of them to their deaths and end up dead anyway. And he wasn't about to do _that._

_“To save one life, to save one world, to save it all… the Doctor must burn.”_

That's what Lamia said, and while the Ponds and River had got it right, they had also got it wrong. 

Because _to save one life_ was just as accurate, in the end, as everything else. The Doctor wasn't going to let River or Amy or Rory sacrifice themselves for the sake of the universe. No, the Doctor knew that closing the cracks would end with the TARDIS stuck in Hell, but while he had no idea _he_ would end up here too, he knew better than to ask them that. 

Not after everything. Not with his new name. 

So, _surprise!_ The Doctor is still alive. Not so nice surprise is that he's stuck in the never-space, the void between worlds, but— 

_Huh. This doesn't look like Hell,_ he muses to himself as he finally looks at the brick walls all around and the blue sky overhead, frowning. 

In fact, it almost looks and feels like Earth. Like, if his nose is to be trusted, the 20th century… 

“Where are you, Doctor?” Rory asks, and the Doctor startles and turns around— 

And, yes, that's Rory, dressed in the clothes he took for their trip to the opera in 1847 and standing at the mouth of the alley with a dejected look on his face. He turns, making to leave after his eyes slide unseeingly over the Doctor's frame— 

“Rory Williams?” he calls softly, voice raspy as if long unused, and stops to clear his throat and think the situation through. 

If that _is_ Rory, dressed in 1847 clothing in the year 1969, this means— 

_“I was actually looking for you because I forgot to tell you something, back in 1969. I swear I saw you then, but you were wearing this. And when you actually came—”_

The Doctor looks down at his shirt, the _Keep Calm_ one Rory gave him _precisely_ because he'd seen him wearing it in 1969 when he should've been trapped in the TARDIS. 

“I'm rewinding,” he whispers as he watches Rory stiffen and hiss at the walkie talkie in his hand. “My time stream is unravelling, erasing… Closing.” 

“Always babbling and _now_ you decide to shut up?” Rory asks the walkie talkie, and the Doctor's so startled that he laughs before he can stop himself. “Don't you dare leave me stranded here, _please._ I've got things to do and – and you need me, whether you like it or not. Where are you going to find a non-irritating human that actually does what you tell him and knows your quirks well-enough to translate for you?” he asks hopefully, and the Doctor's grin softens into a fond smile. 

“I knew I liked you for a reason,” he tells Rory, remembering how steadfast his companion had been, always there when he needed him, even if he didn't want him to be, whether as a kid or an adult. 

He's going to lose him now, forgotten as if the Doctor had never existed – but the Doctor will forever remember Rory. 

“Doctor! I mean, Raggedy Man, Starman, whatever you're calling yourself now, where are you?” he asks, fiddling with the walkie talkie again, and the Doctor frowns. 

Did Rory hear that? No, it can't be, can it? 

“Oh, no, don't you dare!” he shouts at the walkie talkie, all steel with that will to help and never give up, and the Doctor can't help but smile again. 

And then Rory turns and stops in shock, giving him a look, actually _seeing_ him now— 

The Doctor blinks in realization and Rory is gone. Well, Rory and the alley and the sky, _everything_ is gone. 

Instead, he finds himself in a half-collapsed Silurian tunnel under 1880s London, with just the tiniest whiff of artron energy in the air. 

“No…” he whispers, twirling around as he tries to figure out _why_ he's here now – and hears the voices. 

Careful of the damaged structure, he sticks to the walls of the tunnel and scoots closer to the noise, peeking down through the half-collapsed ground— 

“Come on, hurry up! We're almost there!” he hears his voice say as his body stands in the middle of the room, before a bridge narrow enough for the group to go over in a single file— 

The ground shifts under his feet and he jerks back just in time – but a stone falls down. 

He hears his own voice again, mocking the humans, but the falling stone crashing against the walls in its journey down immediately distracts him. 

_Doom-boom, doom-boom._

The drums in the deep. 

But that's – that's _impossible!_ Yes, his timeline might be rewinding, unravelling, but Rory _saw_ him in 1969, and this thing now, with the stone… Does that mean he can actually— 

Another blink, and the Silurian tunnels are replaced by the TARDIS' welcoming warmth and hum. 

He's in the lower level, staring at the door, while Amy mutters something angrily under her breath on the level above. 

The Doctor stays still for a moment, part of him still reeling from the change in scenery while the other is trying to accept the fact that this is his curtain call. And then, once his breath is under control once more, he twists slightly around the column and looks up. 

Amy is tapping at the keys for the TARDIS' manual interface, staring intently into the screen. She's wearing her red sweater, black skirt and black low-heeled boots, and, as he watches, she clicks on the keyboard once more, huffing angrily. 

“I can't believe how hard it is to find someplace that's nice but _not_ a spa,” she grumbles, clicking again. “I know we could always go to Earth, past or future, but I _really_ want to see more of space. I mean, so far, all I've seen is the UK of the future and the one of the past. What about, say, Mars? Can't we go to Mars?” she grumbles, and the Doctor stiffens in realization. 

The UK of the future and the one of the past. Starship UK and the Cabinet Rooms of 1941. This is Amy's last trip – this is when they meet River. 

_“Now, ready for the next trip?” Koschei asks, trying to change the subject from his almost being caught talking with Theta to something that would distract her, but Amy straightens with a chuckle and surprises him once again._

_“The Delerium Archive, 171st century. Ready to go!”_

How had she known where to send them? Koschei had definitely _not_ been the one to suggest the trip, he hadn't been planning on stopping by a museum while Amy was around, knowing she wouldn't probably enjoy it as much as a hands-on trip. He'd assumed the TARDIS had told her, but as he looks at her now… 

“Atlantis. Yay. So _not_ what I signed for.” 

The Doctor twists back behind the column and takes the flip phone out of his pocket, staring at it in disbelief. 

He'd grabbed it before leaving for the Chariot Fair because he'd _finally_ exchanged numbers with Rory, and he wasn't about to have a repeat of their last misadventure when it could be avoided as easily as taking the phone with him. 

But now that he's here, now that he thinks back to meeting River and going through the _Byzantium_ without the shock he'd experienced at the time, he finally realizes Amy had surprised him more than once that day. 

And the only way she could've known how— 

The Doctor inputs his own number and presses _call_ before he can doublethink himself anymore, pressing himself closer to the column when he hears the tone go off overhead. 

Rory had seen him and he'd kicked a stone. The Doctor may _not_ be as intangible or invisible as he would like to be at the moment, and he's going to mess with his own timeline _enough_ with this call to add an apparition to the list. 

“Oh, you have to be kidding. I know he said he's better now, but I don't think _this_ is what he needs,” Amy huffs, walking around the console to reach the phone in its charging slot, and the Doctor shuffles in time with her footsteps to stay hidden behind the column. “Please tell me it's not something crazy,” she whispers, just loud enough between rings that his superior Time Lord hearing catches it, and the Doctor smiles and relaxes almost unconsciously, because that is just so _Amy._ “Hello?” 

It's odd, to hear her voice through the phone and overhead at the same time, so he has to take in another quick breath to force down his nervousness, which leaves his voice sounding almost too calm when he finally answers. 

“Hello, Amelia.” 

He doesn't know what to say or do, not this time, because while he hadn't with Rory either, he'd known Rory had only caught a glimpse of him. With Amy, he needs to have a conversation, casual enough not to make her suspicious yet serious enough that she'll remember his words. 

“Raggedy Man? How many phones do you have in this place?” Amy asks, surprised, and he can hear her shift in place overhead. 

He shouldn't have worried. Amy always knew how to calm him down. 

So, grinning widely, he leans more comfortably against the pillar and shrugs. 

“Who knows?” he answers, and her answering huff makes his grin twitch before he forces it down to focus on the matter at hand. “Listen, I know what our next destination will be. The Delerium Archive, 171st century. It'll be fun.” 

“Your definition of fun is most often than not synonym of danger, you know. Or something gross. Your sense of humor is all twisty, Raggedy Man,” she answers with an audible smile, and the Doctor could _kiss her_ for that perfect opening. 

“That's what Rule 6 is for,” he answers with a huge smile that softens as the memory of _why_ he needs to tell her this comes back to his mind. “If I ever scare you, if it ever looks like I'm losing my mind… Rule 6. Remember that one.” 

“Raggedy Man? What is that about? I mean, don't get me wrong, it's good to know you have something like that in place, but you already have Rules 1 and 2,” she points out, and the Doctor can hear her worry in the way she tries too hard to hide it under curiosity. 

Ah, his little Amelia Pond, all grown up. 

But he can't tell her that, he can't answer her and assuage her fears, not without giving himself away. Not if he wants her to still be her stubborn and strong self, clamoring to join him in the catacombs when all he wants is to keep her safe. 

And he _wants_ to keep her safe. That's a lesson he will learn in the catacombs and aboard the _Byzantium._ A lesson he will _never_ forget, no matter how little he has left to live. 

“I have a good feeling about this next adventure. It'll be magnificent,” he tells her instead, more cheerful as he lets the memories take over – bickering with River and Amy once they finally made it outside, taking the Ponds to Sicily, their chaotic stay in Cardiff, listening to the Ponds in the catacombs under London, losing Amy, Rory trying to distract him with operas and clinging stubbornly to him even when they were far apart, meeting Amy once more as a centurion and discovering the truth behind the cracks, bringing Rory back and rescuing River, fixing _everything—_ “We'll see it all the way through, won't we?” he asks before he can stop himself, blinking his eyes to have them _focus_ on the TARDIS, he's _not_ dying or leaving, not _yet._

“Don't we always?” Amy retorts with a snort, and there's a last bout of clicking before she shuffles to lean comfortably against the controls, mirroring the Doctor's position against the column. “Besides, if this is going to be my last trip, I'm going to get as much out of it as I can.” 

The Doctor takes in a tremulous breath, covering the speaker just in case, before he manages to put together a shaky smile for her. 

“That's the spirit…” he whispers, fighting the tears that threaten to pool in his eyes. 

The last trip. No, this won't be Amy's last trip… but this is certainly the Doctor's last voyage. 

“Raggedy Man? Are you alright? Where are you, do you need help?” Amy asks, now _clearly_ worried and shuffling around once more, and the Doctor curses in his head and wipes his eyes clean. 

Damn it, he hadn't wanted to worry her! 

“Amy, it's alright. I'm just a bit tired, that's all. Remind me to take a break when all this is over,” he answers reassuringly, grinning in amusement as he recalls her idea of a break. 

A _wedding_ isn't exactly what the Doctor would have called relaxing, but if he doesn't have to plan it… Besides, it sounds just about perfect right now. Exactly what the Doctor would prescribe. 

“If I find out you lied to me, you're grounded!” she scoffs, and the Doctor doesn't bother muting his chuckling at the words. “Oh God, I sound like your babysitter. Is that what I am now, your babysitter? Ugh, whatever,” she huffs with a smile in her voice, and he answers it with a grin that she can't see. “Alright, I'll play babysitter this once, but this way we're even, you hear me?” 

He thinks of a little girl letting a stranger into her home, a woman cuffing a would-be burglar to the radiator, a fake constable breaking into a hospital, a Scottish defying the Queen of the United Kingdom, a civilian establishing order in the Cabinet Rooms, a redhead keeping clerics in their place, a believer standing up to a monster, a kid facing up an immortal Time Agent, a storyteller tiptoeing around a time traveler, a centurion keeping the universe at bay. 

Hopeful eyes, a small warm hand, a solid body wrapping all around him, a confident grin. 

“I owe you,” he tells Amy, taking a breath and letting all his confidence into the promise of his next words. “I'll take care of you. Whatever happens, however dark it gets, I'll take care of you. Never doubt that.” 

Because Amy hadn't doubted. She had been by his side, knowing he'd find a solution no matter what, even when he'd thought her dead. Amy had never hesitated to trust him, to believe him capable when _he_ hadn't trusted himself. 

And it had been that, it had been _her_ and _Rory,_ who had made Koschei into the Doctor, into the man he is now. 

“I know, Doctor. I could never forget,” she finally answers with a smile in her voice, and he can't help his next wry grin. 

“Doctor…” he repeats, fond and exasperated at the same time, and ignores her when she starts stammering apologies because— “Always the Doctor, isn't that right?” he muses, looking around the TARDIS and feeling her thrum deepen into a proud purr under his back while Amy cuts herself off, her confusion almost palpable. “Thanks, Amy. And don't worry. It'll be alright,” he promises with a smile, and cuts the call. 

He presses the phone against his chest for a moment longer before he pushes off the column – and when he opens his eyes, he's no longer in the TARDIS. 

It's night, the waning moon hanging in the sky, surrounded by more stars than the human eye can see. And it's a garden, with a whining swing and a vine-wrapped arc and a crushed shed – and a little red-haired girl, asleep on the grass. 

“Oh, Amelia…” he whispers, feeling far fonder than he should probably be when the girl disobeyed his orders to stay inside. 

Well, at least she's wearing a coat, hat and gloves. And look at that! She actually prepared him his sandwich and brought a towel, just in case. 

Amy Pond, taking care of her Raggedy Doctor even before she was old enough to cook. 

“That obvious, wasn't I?” he asks softly, picking the girl up in his arms to cradle against his chest. 

Amelia lets out a kitten snore and shuffles until her cold nose is pressed against his chest, relaxing with a sigh. The Doctor's grin widens as he adjusts his grip, and brings her upstairs. 

Her room looks _much_ better now, with all the knickknacks on her desk and clothes hanging in the open dresser, and the hand-made quilt that gives him flashes of kindly old hands and a baby cooing in an older man's arms. 

It's working, then. Rory remembered Amy, and Amy is remembering her family, bit by bit. It isn't fixed, not yet, the universe is still healing, but that's a good sign. 

So, he adjusts Amelia in his arms, maneuvering her to take off her coat, before he puts the quilt back to lie her under it, taking off her boots and gloves and hat before he finishes tucking her in. It's easy, he finds, surprising himself, even after all these centuries. It seems that some motions are never truly forgotten, no matter how many regenerations one goes through. 

He leaves her clothes in their place before pulling her desk chair next to her bed and taking a seat. 

The Doctor doesn't… he doesn't want to go just yet. 

So, he reaches out slowly and caresses Amelia's bright red hair with featherlight touches. 

“It's funny,” he tells her with a sad grin, pulling his hand back and just watching her nose deeper under the covers with a muffled _mrr._ “I knew I wouldn't be able to hang around forever, but I thought… I thought we would have longer. That I would see you again, the whole gang, and we would smile and go on adventures one more time. Celebrate your wedding. Share jokes, mess with Rory… I thought I would be able to fix everything so we wouldn't have to say goodbye. Silly old Doctor,” he huffs, looking around at her room, her books and toys and the couple pictures that weren't there that first night, this night, not that long ago. “When you wake up, you'll have your parents back, and you won't even remember me. Or, well, you will, but just a little. I'll be nothing but an imaginary friend, a dream. And… that's actually okay. For once in my life, I'm alright with being no one, with being forgotten,” he chuckles, turning his attention to Amelia once more to see her frowning, so he reaches for her and brushes the frown off her tiny face with a thumb, feeling her relax under his touch. “There you go, none of that now. Just because it's a dream, it doesn't mean it's a bad one. Because it wasn't, you know. It was the best of dreams. The daft old man who stole a magic box and ran away. Did I ever tell you that I stole it?” he asks her, but Amelia is still as deeply asleep as before, so he pushes away from the bed and leans against the back of the chair, staring into space as he _remembers._ “Well, I borrowed it. I was always going to give it back. That would've been something to see, you would've enjoyed it,” he chuckles, looking down at the little girl and his grin softens. “But that's alright. You'll still have the most amazing dreams, that's the best thing about that box. It'll never leave you,” he adds, turning to the desk where the TARDIS' model had sat next to two handmade dolls, when the rest of the room had been barren. “Big and small at the same time. Brand new and ancient, and the bluest blue ever,” he whispers, leaning back once more and closing his eyes, remembering _his_ TARDIS, that completely new console room the ancient box made for him, after all their years apart or on different sides, and how no matter where or when, he could always recognize her blue, regardless of shade. “Oh, the times we had… Would have had. Never had…” he manages to choke out, taking in a ragged breath before leaning forward once more, elbows on Amelia's bed as he stares at her relaxed face and musters enough strength to smile again. “In your dreams, it'll all still be there. The Doctor and Amy Pond, and the days that never came,” he promises her, before he turns to the desk – and the large crack glowing threateningly behind it, dimming in spots but yet holding onto the universe. “The cracks are closing, but they can't do it properly until I'm on the other side. I don't belong here anymore, I'm as much their anchor as I was that Dalek's, in the year 14010. All those statues, they were those I fought against, those that had to exist even when everything else was gone because _I_ still existed. And now it's happening again, with the cracks,” he explains, stretching the time he has left with Amelia, but he finds himself standing up nonetheless. “My little Amelia Pond… Goodbye,” he whispers, leaning down for a featherlight kiss on her bright red hair before he finally steps away from the bed. 

Amelia stays asleep, so small and yet so strong and fiery, and the Doctor takes another breath and finds himself surprised when there are no tears to wipe out of his eyes. 

This time, he grabs onto the timeline, stops it before it can unravel him further, because he _knows_ what is coming next and he doesn't want to see it again. He's said his goodbyes already. _This_ is who he wants to go out as. 

So, he turns to the crack, to the void waiting behind it, and reaches for it – and stops. 

Slowly, he puts his hand down and turns around, wide eyes meeting those of the man now sitting on the chair by Amelia's bed. 

Theta smiles like he did in Stonehenge, with fondness, gratefulness, hope and pride… and sadness. 

“No… No, this can't be—” he chokes, taking a step closer, and Theta's smile widens. 

“Oh, but it is. It is, and it is _wonderful.”_

“You can't. You can't leave me too, Theta. I-I _need_ you!” he pleads, trying to take another step only to find himself rooted in the spot, the crack at his back tugging more insistently now. 

“Nah, you don't,” Theta answers dismissively – and stands up, gesturing to Amelia as he gets to his side. “Look. Don't you see? You have Amy, the most stubborn of humans. And Rory, and River – You have them all. _You,_ Koschei. You have all of them now. You don't need me anymore.” 

_“You won't need an imaginary friend anymore.”_

Koschei takes a ragged breath and turns to face Theta, trying to make him _stop,_ to make him _see._

“I will _always_ need you.” 

“And you will always _have_ me,” Theta answers without missing a beat, taking a hand out of that stupidly long trench coat this face always favored. “In here. And here,” he adds poking at each of his hearts and his forehead before his grin softens into a sad smile. “I am the one that is lost without you.” 

“No, you're wrong, you – you _saw_ it, just now, at Stonehenge! The universe needs _the Doctor!”_ he protests, reaching for the ghost but stopping himself before his hands go through his arms and break the illusion. 

“The universe _has_ the Doctor. It has _you,_ Koschei.” 

If Theta had stabbed him through the hearts with a rusted knife, it wouldn't have hurt as much as those words do. 

“I—” he croaks, voice breaking, before he shakes most of the shock off to string words together. “I'm not…” 

“You told me once that the Doctor is the man who makes people better,” Theta tells him when his throat goes dry, grinning genially as he straightens to his full height. “And that's who you are, even if you never realized it before. _You_ made me better, Koschei. _You_ are _my_ Doctor.” 

“What…” Koschei deadpans, because _what in Omega's cursed name—_

Theta's grin softens, as if he knows what he's thinking. 

“Since the beginning, since the first moment we met,” he specifies, nodding knowingly before he lets his gaze drift to faraway memories, his smile turning nostalgic. “You always pushed me to improve, to be better. Stronger, faster, cleverer… No matter what, you always forced me to find a way, to let _nothing_ stop me.” 

“I am a killer, a _destroyer—”_ he hisses with his darkest snarl, trying to get that _utterly stupid_ train of thought _out_ of Theta's airheaded skull— 

“So am I.” 

—and three simple words leave him as useless and vulnerable as the sight of the Vortex and the deafening pattern of the drums. 

It isn't the words, though. It's how _true_ they are. 

“ _Better_ doesn't make me a good person. It just makes me better,” Theta continues with a shrug, calm and unbothered as if they were talking about homework, back at the Academy, instead of _this._ “And you know that, more than anyone else. You have been to that other side; you know what it's like. You can recognize it, stop it, _defeat_ it… or let it rage,” he adds, smile fading and eyes darkening in a way that makes the hair at the back of Koschei's neck stand on edge. “I did horrible things to obtain beautiful results,” he whispers, and Koschei _knows._ “But through it all, you were there. You always came back, no matter what. You gave me hope and strength, and someone to trade blows with,” he continues, the darkness dissipating to leave way to pride once more, but this time, Koschei tenses out of fear of what he's going to say next. “You showed me the darkness, the horrors, and made me figure out how to be better than them, how to find another way. But I fell. _Oh,_ I fell so many times…” he whispers, voice chocking as he looks away, back into the memories that haunt him as much as Theta does Koschei. 

“You were the one who made _me_ better, Theta. I'm just a monster,” he tells the ghost, breaking him out of his gloom to, startlingly enough, _smile_ at Koschei. 

“Everyone is a monster, Koschei. It's what we choose to do with it that makes us monstrous or beautiful,” he proclaims, as if it really was that easy, before the smile turns almost _loving._ “And you, my Koschei… You _are_ beautiful. With all your flaws, with all your scars. Because they have made you who you are today, the man who stood up to the universe and _dared_ it to fight… And the mightiest and most fearsome races of all times _ran.”_

“They ran from _your_ name, _your_ reputation—” 

“They ran because they saw you, and they _believed it,”_ Theta cuts, and Koschei… 

Koschei trembles. Out of fear. Out of hope. Out of the fear to hope. Out of what those words _mean,_ here and now, and from now until forever. 

Because he doesn't _want_ to believe them, he is not… He is not ready, is he? He tried, as best as he could, but Theta can't be saying what he thinks he's saying, what part of him had wished to hear ever since he got it into his head that he could do good, fix things, just like the Doctor did… 

Can he? 

Theta smiles and rests an intangible hand on Koschei's cheek. 

“My Koschei. My Doctor.” 

The tear slips through Theta's fingers as if the ghost wasn't the reason for its presence to begin with. 

He takes in a ragged breath, once, twice, before he finally composes himself long enough to get past the mess of _gratitudedesolationhopelongingprideloss_ that is threatening to choke him. 

And then, he smiles. 

“I'll miss you. I'll never forget you,” he whispers, and Theta takes his hand back with a large and sincere smile and wet eyes. 

“I know… Doctor.” 

The Doctor closes his eyes, letting the word sink in, soothing the pain he had been pushing back ever since he took the new name, as his self finally synchs with it, finally _accepts_ it and lets it resonate through all his dimensions, asserting itself. 

He's the Doctor. From now until the end. 

… Which, to be fair, isn't that far off, but still… 

It feels like this is the very first time he's done something _right_ in his whole life. 

He opens his eyes to see Amelia, asleep in her bed, and smiles. No, this isn't the first time. But it still feels _right._

Theta is nowhere to be seen, and the Doctor feels the kind of relief that comes with acceptance, with letting go of the pain and finally losing himself in the embrace, his best friend's arms wrapped tightly around him, keeping him from harm, as the darkness finally takes him – and he knows the feeling isn't his. 

He gives Amelia one last unseen smile, and finally steps through the crack. 

The world is gone, no time and no space, and for a moment, the Doctor's surprised to see whiteness all around, having expected blackness. 

Oh, well. Who cares? At least there are no drums in this Hell. 

“Activating Protocol 12, Last Message and Reading of the Will—” 

A small part of him is grateful that Amelia was left behind the closed crack, because the shriek that gets out of his throat is embarrassing enough without the words that follow it, which no child should ever hear. The bigger part is actually the one coming up with said words, but there's a tiny sliver of it that is still focused enough to notice the hologram that just popped into existence in the middle of _nowhere._

He remembers another hologram in a newly-reformatted TARDIS' control room, and immediately notices the similarities to that one while boggling at the differences. 

The hologram is clad in formal armor, with a cape hanging at its back, and it's speaking in Gallifreyan, like the last one. But this one is a man, taller than he is now, with red armor and the golden bands of a First Lieutenant, and his hair long enough to tie into a short ponytail at the back of his head. 

Hair that he knows is as black as dark star alloy, and vibrant violet eyes that stay focused on the recorder without fail. 

“Master?” the Doctor whispers before he can stop himself, but the hologram continues obediently with the expected message, as he always did when he'd worn that face. 

“—will be delivered to their intended recipients in the event of my demise while on duty. This message is for—” he continues before the hologram flickers – and changes. 

Oh, he's still the same man, black hair and violet eyes that the hologram doesn't show, but he's not wearing armor anymore, clad in the loose orange and red clothing of their downtime – and with a barely healed scar following just under his left eye before slashing down his cheek all the way to his jawline. 

His eyes are stony as they meet his this time, and the Doctor can't help the startled gasp as he finds himself at the other end of that glare. 

That's – That's after— 

“—the Doctor,” he finishes with the professionalism of the rest of the message, his voice rasping in a way that he remembers all too well. 

He'd changed the message, like Theta had done. The Doctor had almost forgotten… but seeing the scar, still so tender, on his face, and feeling the phantom itching of those he _knows_ are on his chest, he finally remembers _why_ he did it. 

“I don't want to see this,” he whimpers, taking a small step back— 

And the Master's stony facade cracks with a barely held back frown, before it finally crumbles into a pained grimace, turning his head away to glare at the floor. 

“I know. I _know,_ Doctor, but I – I have to do this,” the Master pushes past the knot the Doctor can feel in his own throat. “I cannot just… I cannot just disappear from your life without any kind of explanation. Not after… After what I saw yesterday.” 

“Please, _don't,”_ the Doctor begs, racking his mind for whatever he recorded so he can push away the dread pooling in his stomach. 

“Really?” the Master questions with an eyebrow lifted judgmentally – before his whole face twitches as the skin stretches with the movement, putting a darkness in his gaze that the Doctor remembers all too well. “I know what you think of me. You made your thoughts all too clear after I killed that _monster._ And I know what you told me then – I acted in fear. You were right. I did. I was _terrified_ she would somehow escape custody and get her hands on me again,” the Master hisses, still looking away from the Doctor and carefully reaching for the scar on his face. “And I was embarrassed, I was so _ashamed_ to have been weak enough to fall in their grasp, to be overpowered and need _rescue,”_ he spits out, snarling at the ground, before stopping and taking in a deep breath, jaw twitching in a way the Doctor recognizes as the Master trying to mute the drums. “But there was another reason I lashed out as I did. Because I was afraid you would get to her first,” he adds, finally looking up to meet the Doctor's eyes with steel and, hidden deep inside, in a place only the Doctor and one other person would ever find, he sees the _fear._ “You scolded me for killing her. But if you had had your way with her, like you did with the other two…” 

“It would have been worse than death,” the Doctor whispers, a shudder wracking his body so hard that he has to sidestep to keep his footing as he _remembers._

“It would have been worse than death,” the Master agrees, hesitating before letting his shields down once more to let the Doctor see just how _scared_ and _tired_ he actually is. “You _terrified_ me, Theta. That was… that was honestly terrifying. I know you came to my rescue, and that you did what you had to do to get me out of there, but… You could have found another way; I _know_ you could have. You are a _brilliant_ person, Doctor, not that – that _Bringer of Darkness_ they call you now. You are supposed to be mischief and cheer, _I_ am the moody one,” he explains, and the Doctor shivers when he speaks those last words without the annoyance or the humor he was expecting. 

“Oh, you've seen nothing yet…” 

“Of course you were not,” the Master huffs, rolling his eyes with only a twitch of his left as a sign of how uncomfortable that was with the new scar. “I told you, it was _terrifying._ And that is not something I ever expected to have to tell you, Theta. I hope I do not have to do so ever again.” 

“I'm sorry…” the Doctor whispers, grimacing in shame, and the Master's shoulders slump with a tired sigh. 

“No, I do not think you are. Do not misunderstand, I know you are sorry for disturbing me, but… you are not sorry for what you did. I do not think you will ever be,” the Master whispers, and the Doctor hesitates, thinking back – and realizes the Master is right. 

He's fairly sure Theta was _never_ sorry for rescuing him, for the way she did it, in any of his regenerations. And while the Master did twist into quite a monster himself in time, _that_ memory was still enough to make him wary of the Doctor even centuries after that. 

“You're right,” the Master huffs after a couple seconds of silence, and the Doctor looks at him in confusion. “However, we can only live for so long. Which is the reason behind this message,” he adds, gesturing around with a tiny grin on his face. “I know you do not need me. You never did, and you never will. But I still want you to promise me one thing. Find someone.” 

“What?” the Doctor asks with a startled blink, completely lost as to _where_ that came from. 

“Not _that_ kind of someone. Just… someone you can adventure with. Because you _do_ need someone. Someone to stop you. And if I cannot be there for you, I do not want you to be alone. I _know_ you, Theta. You will blame yourself if there was no avoiding my demise, and if there _is_ someone to blame… You will hunt them down, regardless of who or what they are. Even if it is yourself,” he whispers, and the Doctor gulps because _that_ can't be right, can it? 

Theta was extraordinary, yes, and after becoming the Doctor, he became… Well, yes, he did need people around, both to keep him entertained, to share in their joy and, as the Master has just said, to keep him in line. 

… Something the current Doctor _also_ needs, truth be told. They aren't that different, after all. 

“I do not want to… I do not want to learn of what you can do, when you have no one by your side,” the Master adds, and the Doctor grimaces once more. 

No, he definitely didn't want that, did he? He's not sure he wants to figure it out _now._

“Do _not_ give me empty promises, Theta,” the Master hisses, and the Doctor startles at the venom in his voice. “I know you would never allow anything to happen to me, I have _seen_ it. But you know _I_ would never let anything happen to _you._ And need I remind you who is the Prydonian here?” he mocks, opening his arms in reference to the armor he's not currently wearing, and the Doctor rolls his eyes. 

“ _Both_ of you are, idiot. Just because she ended up in the Arcalian Chapterschool doesn't make her any less of a meddlesome troublemaker.” 

“Your insults require work,” the Master snorts, his grin turning to a hesitant look before he finally turns back to glaring at the ground with an explosive huff. “You know I will always be the first to lose control of my temper. I just – I _try,_ but I cannot always hold them back,” he hisses, a hand clutching his head – and the Doctor stiffens in shock. 

“You can't be talking about…” 

“It is… A secret, one I have kept out of fear ever since the initiation. I thought… I believed _everyone_ to be afflicted like I was, but I have since learnt how wrong I am,” he confesses with a grimace, and the Doctor gawks like a fish, wondering how he could have ever forgotten _this._ “When I first stared into the Time Vortex, I heard drums. A rhythm of four, like the heartsbeat of a Time Lord. But it was not until I was taken away that I realized it was _not_ my own hearts. It was _in my head,”_ he adds, looking up with a look the Doctor can only call _begging._ “They still are. And they fuel my rage, fan the flames of my anger when I lose control, when I let my emotions get the best of me. I fear… I _know_ they will lead me to my death, eventually. I can only hope you are not around to shoulder the weight. But knowing us, I am fairly sure it will be—” he adds with a snort, cutting himself before he can finish that thought – before he finally steels himself enough to meet the Doctor's eyes once more. “It will be _for you._ Doctor, I—” 

And the hologram crackles, vanishing, _changing—_

The Master that is left in its wake is clad in black and hunched over, clawing the console with one hand to keep himself upright while the other is wrapped around his head. He has stubble on his jaw, and the scar on his eye is fully healed. His breathing is ragged and his face is twisted in a pained expression that puts the Doctor on edge even before the Master's panicked eyes meet his. 

“What the – What's going on?!” the Doctor shouts, and the Master answers with a gasp, grimacing, before he puts himself together enough to look up at him once more. 

“Doctor, you have to – you have to listen to me, _please._ I have met you, in the future, and I know— _ngh—_ I _know_ I am dead. I can only hope you will… That you will see this, that it can be averted – Ugh, just a bit longer!” he shouts, fighting to stay upright, to keep the pain at bay, and the Doctor looks the hologram over frantically, trying to find blood or any kind of injury that could explain _this,_ because he can't remember this _at all._ “Doctor, you are not a good man. I know everyone thinks so, but you are _not_ a good man! Please, I _beg_ you, _remember this!_ I can – I can feel the memories being ripped out of my mind; I cannot hold on any more… Please, just – _do not be a good man._ Doctor you have to— _Argh!”_ he roars, finally collapsing to his knees – and goes still. 

The Doctor freezes, staring at the Master with fear in his eyes and his hands shaking, and, slowly, the hologram twitches and straightens, looking mildly pained but mostly confused. 

“Why am I… Ugh, my head. What did the Doctor do this time?” he asks himself, getting to his feet – and blinking in surprise down at the TARDIS console. “And why is this—?” he asks, flipping a switch that finally ends the message. 

The Doctor stays there, staring wide-eyed at where the Master had been, before he realizes the TARDIS console is still there and it's _his._ His TARDIS, with the warm white and copper color scheme and the wavy configuration, the bubble strings waiting patiently in the time rotor. 

“No… No, come back! You can't leave me like that!” he shouts, rushing to the console to play the message again, forwarding straight to the warning, but nothing changes the second time he sees it. “What is that? What is he talking about, what was _that?!”_ he shouts at the TARDIS, expecting an answer, but all he gets is a confused thrum and a worried prod at his mind. “You can't play that and not have the answer! What was he talking about? I can't remember that, I can't remember it _at all!_ Which Doctor did he meet? Was that solved? _Tell me!”_ he snaps, glaring at the time rotor, but the TARDIS only answers with a pained whine and a telepathic hug. “Don't give me that…” he hisses, but he's more afraid than angry now, leaning into her embrace before he pushes himself free of her presence. “After everything – after _everything—I'm alive!”_ he shouts rounding on nothing and everything with his time feelers whipping around as he lets his anger _blaze._ “I'm still _alive!_ After everything I've done and suffered and gone through, I'm still alive! Against all odds, I _did_ it, I _survived._ Trapped in between universes, yes, but alive. And what did you do? You had to go and get in trouble and warn me when I'm stuck _here!_ When there’s _no chance_ I can do _anything!_ Because that's who you were, isn't it? You were always this, getting in trouble and waiting for me to get you out!” he roars, slashing a hand and glaring at the memory of Theta's grin back in Amelia's room. “You were waiting for me all this time, when I had already had my time! I wasn't remotely important, but look at me now! You _made me_ into this! You made me, and I threw it all away when there's who knows what else waiting out there, threatening everything I have given my life to protect and _it's not fair!_ I could do so much more. _So much more!”_ he shouts, but his only answer is the TARDIS' pained groan and her tentative prod for another hug that he shrugs away as he turns to glare at the controls and the record button. “But this is what I get. My _reward._ It's not fair,” he hisses – and when the TARDIS wraps around him this time, not asking permission to engulf him in her warm telepathic embrace, he drops to his knees, boneless, with a chocked sob. “Oh. I've lived too long,” he whispers, staring at his mismatched hands, one scarred and the other unmarked. “Why couldn't I just die when I crossed over? Why did I have to live? I was _happy,_ I'd saved everyone, fixed everything that could be fixed. And now, I'm stuck here, worrying about things that are probably long over, but never knowing if I'm correct.” 

The TARDIS hums, rocking him in her hold, and the Doctor relaxes and lets his mind empty of any doubts and fears and dark thoughts, leaving only the TARDIS— 

_The TARDIS!_

“You're in my head,” he gasps, looking up at the bubble strings, and this time, the TARDIS _sings,_ bubble strings pistoning animatedly while she wheezes excitedly all around him. “You… You want to… to _bond?_ But I'm—” 

_“My Koschei. My Doctor.”_

“Oh, that's _cheating.”_

But she laughs and clings tighter to him, and the Doctor finally gives up all resistance and lets her establish the link he'd been longing for even longer than he'd realized he did. 

And if a couple tears fall down his cheeks, there's no one there to berate him for them. 

_Knock-knock-knock!_

… Well. There _shouldn't_ be. 

He quickly wipes his face clean and grabs his screwdriver, approaching the door cautiously because he's supposed to be in the middle of _the never-space._ Who could be knocking at the TARDIS' door? 

His Ponds, apparently. And the never-space looks _a lot_ like a wedding reception, all of a sudden. 

“Hello, Doctor. Did we surprise you this time?” Rory asks, wearing a gray-jacket-black-pants tuxedo and grinning madly, while Amy puffs up in front of her husband, radiant in her wedding dress and with the smuggest smile the Doctor has ever seen on her face. 

“What.” 

“I found you. I found you in words, like you taught me. I found you in the story of the brand new, ancient blue box,” Amy answers, waving around an old TARDIS-shaped book that the Doctor recognizes with a start. 

“What are you doing with that?!” 

“Calm down, we didn't peek. I remembered,” Rory tells him with an eyeroll, but he's still grinning proudly as Amy lets the Doctor take River's diary to shove it into a pocket to avoid temptation. 

“Something old. Something new. Something borrowed. Something blue,” Amy recites, undeterred by his bafflement or her book's disappearance. “I remembered, and I brought you back.” 

“You… remembered. Both of you? And you… thought me back into existence?” he asks, putting their words together with the story he told little Amelia when he brought her to her room, that night fourteen years ago. 

“Yes. And you are _late_ to our wedding,” Amy chastises with a large grin, and the Doctor finally looks around. 

Well. It definitely _does_ look like a wedding reception. And all those people at the long table must be Amy's and Rory's families. 

“It worked.” 

“Yes, it did.” 

“Definitely did.” 

“No more plastic.” 

“I haven't checked that yet.” 

“Shut up, stupid.” 

“Shutting up.” 

The Doctor snorts and turns to his Ponds once more, who are looking into each other's eyes with love and joy and— 

“Oh, shut up and come here!” the Doctor exclaims, dragging them down into a strong hug, which they return as soon as they get over their shock. “I could kiss you both!” 

“Don't you _dare!”_ Amy scolds as she pushes him off them, while Rory squawks and steps to be behind his wife. 

The Doctor laughs. 

“Easy, Rory. From now on, I shall be leaving the kissing duties to the brand-new Mrs. Pond,” he tells his nurse with a sharp grin, and Amy straightens proudly while Rory sighs in relief – and startles. 

“No, it's not Mr. and Mrs. Pond. That's not how it works.” 

“Yeah, it is.” 

Rory and Amy exchange a look – and grin. 

“Yeah, it is,” they repeat in unison, startling when the Doctor claps his hands and turns to the long table. 

“Hello, everyone! Very sorry for the wait, give me a moment to change and get my box off of the dance floor and we can continue with the festivities!” 

“Who are you?” a short balding man asks, gawking, and the Doctor grins sharply and spreads his arms. 

“Isn't it obvious? I'm Amy's imaginary friend, the Doctor. You didn't think I would miss this, did you?” 

And, plan in mind, he squeezes past his Ponds and back into the TARDIS. 

He has a wedding to attend. 

So, he closes the doors, adjusts the date, prepares his present with some precise hops – and as soon as the TARDIS vanishes from the dance floor, leaving the Ponds grinning after the scene that has been the father of the bride's speech, the Doctor steps forward from where he's been watching the proceedings and pulls off his fake beard and wig. 

“After all, I've been here all along!” he calls, startling the whole room into turning to the dais and the band that he joined six months ago after their keyboard player mysteriously won the lottery and moved on. 

“Did you seriously—” Rory starts asking, but Amy's laughter immediately muffles the rest of his words. 

Someone starts clapping, praising the 'magic trick', and so the Doctor obediently sketches a bow before stepping to the keyboard with a wink at the Ponds. 

“Let's get this party started, shall we?” 

And without waiting for an answer, he starts playing _I'm a Believer,_ the Smash Mouth version. 

The reception descends into laughter and dancing and _fun_ after that, and Amy even manages to drag the Doctor into a couple dances—with her _and_ with Rory—once he's left the band to play on their own. 

“Where did you learn to play the piano?” 

“I don't just play the piano.” 

“That's not an answer.” 

But the Doctor grins and slips away, leaving Amy to dance with her dad while he leans against the wall next to a window, watching his Ponds move softly against each other with the next slow song – and turning his head to exchange a grin with River, who's standing outside the window. 

He makes his way out not long after, once he's sure Amy and Rory are distracted enough, and meets with River by the TARDIS, parked in Amy's garden. 

“What did you play?” she asks as she stops in front of him, and he leans against the TARDIS' door and grins. 

“ _I'm a Believer.”_

“Neil Diamond?” 

“Smash Mouth,” he corrects, and she grins with a glint of recognition in her eyes, before he hands her back her diary and the Vortex manipulator. “I didn't peek. Neither did they,” he adds, softer, and she flips through a couple of pages before pocketing the book with a smile and strapping the Vortex manipulator to her wrist. 

“Not even a little bit? Aren't you curious?” 

“I think I can live with the suspense,” he answers, and her smile this time makes her eyes crinkle. “How did you meet me, River?” 

“Spoilers,” she whispers, turning her attention to the Vortex manipulator. 

“Was it this face?” 

“Spoilers.” 

“Can you answer _anything?”_

“I thought you said you could live with the suspense,” she reminds him with a mischievous grin, and the Doctor huffs and lets his head drop against the TARDIS with a soft thud. 

“I lied. Answer me now,” he retorts petulantly, and she chuckles and lets her hands drop. 

“Alright,” she answers, and he straightens attentively— “ _Spoilers.”_

“ _Ugh,”_ he grunts, once more deflating against the door while River chuckles. “Who _are_ you?” he moans, glaring at her half-heartedly – and River's smile turns almost _sad._

“You're going to find out very soon now. And I'm sorry, but that's when everything changes,” she tells him – and vanishes with a crackle of electricity. 

The Doctor stays in the garden, staring into empty air – and snorts. 

“Yeah. That sounds about right,” he whispers into the night, before turning to the TARDIS and opening the door— 

“Oi! Where are you off to?” Amy shouts as she follows him into the TARDIS, and the Doctor grins even as he keeps his back to her. 

“Can't you seriously take _one_ evening off? You just saved the whole of space and time!” Rory exclaims in disbelief, closing the door behind his back, and the Doctor finally turns around to face them. 

“Sorry, you two. I should've known better than to slip away. But you know, I'm a busy man,” he explains as he waves a hand with a grin, before becoming serious. “And space and time aren't safe yet. The TARDIS was drawn to this particular date and blew up. There must have been a reason for that, and I'm going to figure it out.” 

“Raggedy Man?” 

“Yes, Amy?” 

“Remember when we went to the Delerium Archive?” 

“Yes, Amy.” 

“And you called me to tell me we were going to the Delerium Archive?” 

“Yes, Amy, I remember. What's this about now?” he asks impatiently, looking up from the controls – and Amy grins sharply. 

“Take. A. Break.” 

The Doctor blinks— 

_“Amy, it's alright. I'm just a bit tired, that's all. Remind me to take a break when all this is over.”_

—and grimaces. 

“Can't I just—” 

“ _Break,”_ Amy and Rory say in unison, and the Doctor finally gives up with a sigh and a grin. 

“Oh, alright. But just because it's you,” he agrees, and smiles when they grin triumphantly, so _proud_ of his Ponds. “What do you guys say about a honeymoon _out of this world?”_

**Author's Note:**

> ... Yeah. _That._ Don't worry, you aren't the only ones that got slapped in the face with _that_ (if you were surprised by the turn of events, that is). The characters do what they want, it says so on the tags. And that's the reason it took me awhile to post it, when the writing itself was actually quite quick. I had to figure out if I could work with everything that just happened. Which, as it turns out, I can - with the addition of one episode to this 'Season 01' mess that _Last of the Time Lords_ has become. I swear, I was only going to write _one_ one-shot...
> 
> So, yeah, one more episode on this before we jump to Season 06/Season 02. You can think of it as the Christmas Special, if you want (though it's a bit late for Christmas). Hoo, boy...
> 
> If anyone else thinks like me, that the Master has taken the whole 'Doctor' thing too well, don't worry. That's what the Christmas Special is for. Also, **question time:** Who suspected the phone call in _Silence in the Catacombs_ was the Doctor's 'visit' from his rewinding? And the 'drums in the deep' and Rory's 'hallucination'? I be curious.
> 
> Yes, the Master wasn't planning to come back, but he trained Amy and Rory too well. I'm _so proud_ of those two *sniff*
> 
> And _of course_ there had to be a Protocol 12 for the Master! There's a reference in it to Ten's line in _The End of Time_ about why the Doctor wouldn't take Wilf's gun: _"The Master is going to kill you." "Yeah." "Then kill him first." "And that's how the Master started."_ Always thought it was a _very_ interesting thing to say, and since we haven't seen anything about that in the TV show (no idea about comics or audios), I made my own version. Also, it had to tie in with the whole _Bringer of Darkness_ thing, because we haven't seen _that_ either.
> 
> What _was_ that whole _good man_ thing about, anyway? Why, I haven't _the faintest_ idea! *insert evil grin*
> 
> So, without further ado...
> 
>  **Next Time:** The Doctor's friends get together one last time for the Doctor's funeral - and the last person they expected crashes the party.


End file.
